As the world marks International Rural Women’s Day, PAN Asia Pacific (PANAP) and its partners release Unequal Fields: Advancing Land Rights, Labour Protection, and Sustainable Livelihoods for Rural Women in Southeast Asia. Grounded on community-based research across Malaysia, Vietnam, Laos, Cambodia, and Indonesia, the report reveals injustices in land ownership, wages, and social protection that continue to push rural women—particularly farmers, agricultural workers, migrants and Indigenous peoples—into precarity.
Despite their central role in sustaining food systems, rural women remain landless, underpaid, and excluded from policies meant to protect them. They endure poverty wages, unsafe and insecure work environments, without access to social protection. These realities are made even harsher by climate change, pesticide exposure, and the lingering impacts of COVID-19 pandemic. Unequal Fields shows that these are not isolated struggles but the result of deep structural inequalities, including corporate monopoly in food and agriculture systems and the continued neglect of rural communities in national priorities. Yet, rural women continue to organise, support one another, and lead collective action – calling for universal, inclusive and gender-responsive social protection systems rooted in justice, accountability and equality.
The report’s launch forms part of PANAP’s 16 Days of Global Action on Agroecology (October 1-16), a campaign highlighting rural women’s leadership in reclaiming land, livelihoods, and dignity. PANAP urges governments and ASEAN to move beyond rhetoric and act decisively—ensuring land security, decent work, and genuine participation of rural women in shaping the policies that affect their lives. As Unequal Fields reminds us, equality and rights for rural women are essential to building sustainable, just and people-led food systems across the region.
You can access the publication here.
