Unbundling water and land rights in Kilifi County, Kenya: a gender perspective

Abstract

Feminist scholars and activists have drawn attention to the importance of
women’s land rights, and studies focused on irrigation have explored the gendered
relationships between land and water rights. Yet little of this work has focused
on the relationship between land and water rights for domestic and productive
purposesmore broadly.Within rural communities, women andmen have di􀀀erent
rights to both land and water.We explore these interconnected relationships using
community profiles, focus group discussions, and in-depth interviews from two
communities as well as survey data collected from multiple adult members of
rural households in Kilifi County, Kenya. Using a bundle of rights framework, we
find that few individuals hold the complete bundle of rights over water, and the
extent to which the rights are acknowledged by others and enforceable varies by
the land-water tenure system. The full bundle of rights to water ismost likely to be
complete and most robust for men who have private water points on household
land they hold. Even then, other people may assert claims to water at the water
point, although these claims may involve negotiation or payment. Many water
rights across the land-tenure systems are shared with others rather than being
held by one individual. As such, the ability to negotiate water access is particularly
important. The duration of the rights, or the length of time for which the rights
are held, is embedded in social relations and exchange, particularly on others’
household land. Women more than men seem to maintain a complicated set
of social networks that allow them to negotiate for water from other women
who manage the water transactions. The process of negotiation needs to be
re-articulated each time. Thus, the duration of these rights to water depends on
the ongoing relationships.