A/HRC/22/72 rural women as equal to rural men, to women and men in general. This requires that States acknowledge the multiple patterns of discrimination faced by rural women and that targeted action be undertaken. 75. In parallel to the legal obligations, research attests that addressing inequality between men and women in access to productive resources is beneficial for economic growth and development. A 2011 study by FAO suggests that if rural women had equal access with men to productive resources, they could increase yields on their farms by 20 to 30 per cent, thereby reducing the toll of people going hungry by 100 to 150 million. Women would thus contribute to both food security and economic growth. 115 The Special Rapporteur on the right to food proclaims gender equality and women’s empowerment as the “secret weapon against hunger”.116 76. Strategies and policies for the protection of rural women should be directed towards: (a) Ratification of international law instruments which have been referred to in part II of the Study to offer protection to the rights of women in rural areas and/or the elimination of reservations made thereon; (b) The transposition of international law provisions addressing the rights of women in rural areas into national legislation. This may require reform of existing laws but also the passing of new legislation. Both should address traditions or social customs, the effect of which is discriminatory against rural women, including through affirmative action policies; (c) Adequate international cooperation and foreign aid policies for rural women. Currently this is happening only marginally. For instance, Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development estimates show that in recent years only 5 per cent of aid directed to the agricultural sector specifically focused on gender equality. 117 Moreover, in the context of an increasingly liberalized trade in agricultural products, governmental strategies and policies should be designed to specifically protect women’s access to food and to enhance their capacity and entitlement to purchase food; (d) Equal access to and control of land and other rural productive resources. National laws and policies have to guarantee women’s right to land and property rights. Legislation needs to promote changes, including in customary law, to provide for the registration of land in women’s names and the consent of women to the modification of the land rights. Contract-farming schemes that favour women as contractors could be encouraged to offset the generalized practice whereby buyers contract almost always men.118 National instruments also need to recognize and support women in processes of adaptation and mitigation of climate change and disaster risk reduction by protecting resources of water, food, energy, livelihoods and health; (e) The establishment of financial services responsive to women’s needs and concerns, and which address women as direct beneficiaries. Safety-net mechanisms and the emergency food reserves may constitute strategies to address rural women’s food insecurity due to high prices of commodities.119 Encouragement of bank loans in women’s names 115 116 117 118 119 FAO, The State of Food and Agriculture 2010–2011: Women in Agriculture. Closing the Gender Gap for Development, Rome, 2011. See also FAO, Gender Equality, available at www.fao.org/docrep/014/am859e/am859e10.pdf. O. de Schutter, “Our secret weapon against hunger: gender equality and women’s empowerment”, Gender Network, 2012. OECD, The Development Co-operation Report, 2011. O. de Schutter, note 119 above. CSW Report, para. 18. 19