As a woman, Isatou says she feels like a refugee in her own country. “Women are disillusioned,” she says. “We are like foreigners in our own country. We barely own any land.”

Until recently, Isatou grew rice on borrowed land – enough to feed her family and provide a small surplus to sell. Despite her investment in the land, last year the landlord demanded his land back without notice, depriving her of her means of survival. The land is now idle.

“Cases like this are rampant here,” says Isatou. To change this, Isatou took part in ActionAid’s HungerFREE Women ‘caravan’ which travelled through The Gambia and brought women together to demand an end to hunger and to discrimination in land ownership. “Let us start by letting women own land wherever they are in this country and they will feed this nation. Without that we will surely continue to be hungry.”

Women in The The Gambia explain the obstacles they face in feeding themselves and their families and Aja Isatou Fayinkey offers some solutions.

CAMPAIGN FRONTLINE: On rural Woman's day, 17th October 2008, ActionAid The Gambia launched the HungerFREE Women cross-country caravan. We met with women farmers, chiefs, governors and local religious leaders to address the food crisis and the lack of women’s ownership of land.

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