We are a diverse group, women and men, from all regions of the world who came together in this EGM convened by Global Land Indicators Initiative, UN Habitat, Oxfam, Landesa, Huairou Commission and UN Women. We are from governments including national stati

We are a diverse group, women and men, from all regions of the world who came together in this EGM convened by Global Land Indicators Initiative, UN Habitat, Oxfam, Landesa, Huairou Commission and UN Women. We are from governments including national statistical organizations and land agencies, multi-lateral agencies, civil society organizations, including women’s organizations and groups that met on July 8 – 9, 2017 to discuss women’s land rights in the context of the SDGs. We note with high importance the much needed transformation required at local and national levels to create gender equitable land access and secure rights, as well as women’s involvement in decision making about their land and related resources as a basis for more equitable societies and to eradicate poverty. We strongly affirm and support UN member states’ commitments in the 2030 Agenda which offer an unprecedented global opportunity to strengthen land rights for all. The 2030 Agenda places land rights at the core of global development priorities, recognizing its foundational link to eradicating poverty (Goal 1), ensuring food and nutrition security (Goal 2), promoting gender equality and empowerment of women and girls (Goal 5), sustainable cities (Goal 11) and life on land (Goal 15). Secure land rights also contribute to achieving other SDG goals, including peace and security. We recognize the provision of land related SDG targets and explicit land indicators in the SDGs for measuring progress on women’s land rights. We affirm and support the development of globally comparable and nationally applicable methodology to generate primary and sex-disaggregated data to assess and track progress on women’s land rights. We strongly support efforts to ensure land governance reforms that leave no one behind as well as policies and programs that respect, secure and protect all tenure rights to land and other natural resources for all women, including women at all stages of their life cycle, with different status in their households or communities, women who are small-scale producers, pastoralists, or fishers, indigenous women, and women who live in areas affected by conflict or have been displaced. We support the full implementation of the Voluntary Guidelines on the Responsible Governance of tenure of land, fisheries and forests in the context of national food security which enshrines the principles of gender equality and recognition of the continuum of land rights. We support the efforts of the custodian agencies in developing and refining a global methodology for monitoring progress of all land related indicators in the SDGs including 1.4.2, 5.a.1 and 5.a.2 addressing women’s land rights. We affirm the importance to secure land indicators in the SDGs monitoring framework and the need for country capacity strengthening for National Statistical Offices, CSOs and other stakeholders in data collection and reporting on these indicators.