FEATURE ARTICLE
PRACTICAL GENDER NEEDS •
Easy access to clean drinking water
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Adequate shelter against the elements [heat + rain]
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Hygienic disposal of waste
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Easy access to fuel for cooking
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Access to cooling facilities to store perishables (fridges aren’t the norm)
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Safe spaces for children to play and be watched over
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Access to affordable medical care
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Access to emergency trauma facilities
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Provision for earning income from home
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Access to micro-credit
STRATEGIC GENDER NEEDS •
Access to resources
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Control over resources
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Increased economic independence
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Right to own land
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Right to involvement in use and design of spaces
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Freedom of time
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Freedom of choice [child-bearing, child-rearing, education, employment]
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Safe facilities for family care
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Reliable infrastructure
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Protection against sexual abuse
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Political equality for representation
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Removal of gender-based division of labour
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Removal of prohibitory cultural mind-set of ‘natural capital’ [sexual, physical and gender superiority mind-set]
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Alleviation from status of ‘second class citizens’
A closer look at the ‘triple role’ that the women of Manyatta play - reproduction, production and community management - reveals a growing inequity faced by them on a daily basis. Where there is open confrontation between community-level organizations and local authorities, in attempts to put direct pressure on the state or non-governmental organizations for infrastructural provision, again it is women who as an extension of their domestic role frequently take
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CITY OBSERVER | June 2016
primary responsibility for the formation, organization and success of local-level protest groups. Women, within their gender-ascribed roles of wives and mothers, struggle to manage their neighbourhoods. In performing this third role, they also implicitly accept the sexual division of labour and the nature of their gender subordination. While gender inequality issues exist throughout the world, the impact of this inequity is felt differently in developing or underdeveloped