The reform of China's collectivelyowned forest land, began in 2008, is arguably the largestland-reform undertaking in modern times in terms of area andpeople affected. Under the reform, forest lands have beencontracted to rural households, allowing them moreindependence in exercising their rights and interests in theforest lands, giving them more opportunities to improvefamily incomes, and creating incentives for them tocultivate, conserve, and manage forests. These lands arehome to some 610 million people, many of them poor. Withurbanization, vast numbers of Chinese men have migrated tocities to work, leaving women as the predominant labor forcein rural areas. Indeed, some 70 percent of China’sagriculture labor force is now female. The immense scope ofthis change calls for a systematic examination of howChina's rural women gain access to and exploit forestland and associated resources and services. The reform wasdesigned to unfold in two broad stages. In the first,collectively owned forest lands suitable for contractingwere allocated on equal terms to each household in affectedvillages. The ongoing second stage represents a deepening ofthe reform. It deals with subsidies and ecologicalcompensation, financial services (including use of foresttenure as collateral and transfers of forest land), forestinsurance, technical services and training, farmers’associations and cooperatives, and market services. However,the monitoring had not covered the gender dimension of thereform, meaning that the gender data required to accuratelyreflect the full effects of the reform have been lacking.Building on the annual monitoring conducted by the FEDRC,the study reported here added gender-related investigationand analysis to obtain gender data about the current reformsituation, its problems, and their causes. It also includedstructured interviews with rural women and group meetingswith local government agencies, women’s federations, andvillage committees.The ultimate objective of the study is toachieve better gender-responsiveness in China’s collectiveforest tenure reform. Specifically, this includes: (i)equality in access to and control of forest lands, as wellas access to associated resources and services; (ii) women’sparticipation and equality in decision-making concerning theconservation and utilization of forest resources; and (iii)impacts of the first two aspects on the status andwell-being of women.The World Bank has had over 30 yearsof successful cooperation with China in the forestry sector.Women’s access to the services and resources that are thefocus of the second stage of the reform will be a criticalelement of the World Bank’s continuing reform dialogue withits Chinese partners.
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