National dialogues, technical guidelines and practical field tools are helping embed gender equality into technical processes.  

RECOFTC is working with national partners and government agencies in Lao PDR to help integrate gender into participatory land use and forest management planning and land tenure recognition in forestland.  

Through the Mekong Region Land Governance project, we facilitated and promoted policy dialogues, developed multi-stakeholder platforms, provided on-the-ground coaching and support, and developed and refined technical guidelines.  

Our collaborators included technical staff from the Department of Forestry, Department of Land and Department of Agricultural Land Management. We also worked with the Lao Women’s Union and Village Focus International.

We conducted community consultation workshops, awareness raising on land rights, and data collection on land and forest use. The work has supported efforts to delineate village administrative boundaries and guided villagers through the technical steps required for forestland tenure recognition.  

To build capacity and integrate gender perspectives at every stage outlined in the government’s Procedural guidelines on participatory land tenure recognition in forestland, we developed training materials and practical tools. A checklist aligned with national policies and legal frameworks was developed along with the guidelines to embed gender sensitivity into each phase of land and forest management planning.  

These tools have been piloted in Khammouane and Luang Prabang provinces. The procedural guidelines and gender training manual will be distributed nationwide to strengthen land tenure recognition in forest land throughout Lao PDR.