Across Southern Africa, rural women are already responding to the climate crisis. They are saving indigenous seed. They are planting food in changing seasons. They are restoring soil, sharing knowledge, protecting biodiversity, feeding families and rebuilding after droughts, floods and cyclones. They are doing this despite unequal access to land, water, finance, markets and decision-making spaces. Yet too often, the people closest to the crisis are the furthest from the tables where solutions are discussed.The Rural Women’s Assembly is bringing together rural women leaders, small-scale farmers, policymakers, researchers, funders, government representatives and allies for a three-day Consultative Dialogue under the theme:
We Have the Answers: Building Resilient Food Systems
The dialogue will create a space for rural women from across Southern Africa to speak from lived experience and to place their knowledge, demands and solutions at the centre of discussions on food systems, climate justice, seed sovereignty and agroecology. For generations, rural women have protected the seeds that feed communities, preserved indigenous food knowledge and sustained families through changing climates and economic hardship. Their work is not simply about survival. It is about building food systems that are rooted in dignity, biodiversity, justice and community control.
This dialogue will ask urgent questions.
How can governments and institutions support women-led agroecology at the scale it deserves?
What will it take to protect farmer-managed seed systems from laws and policies that limit seed saving, exchange and sale?
How can climate finance reach rural communities directly, rather than stopping with governments and large institutions?
What must change for women farmers to access land with water, fair markets, technology, public investment and political power?
Over three days, participants will engage in grassroots testimonies, policy dialogues, practical agroecology learning, climate speak outs, discussions with funding partners and exchanges with government and parliamentary representatives.The dialogue will also create space to strengthen a collective regional agenda for food sovereignty, women’s leadership and resilient food systems. It is a call to move beyond speaking about rural women as beneficiaries and instead recognise them as producers, innovators, seed guardians, organisers and leaders. Rural women are not waiting for solutions to arrive from outside. They are already carrying them in their seeds, their fields, their knowledge, their communities and their movements. Join us as we listen, learn, organise and build a stronger regional voice for food systems that put people, land, water, seed and dignity first.
Register Now
Be part of the conversation. Bring your experience, your questions and your commitment to building food systems that are just, resilient and led by the people who feed our communities.
Date: 7th-9th June, 2026
Venue: University of Pretoria, Future Africa
Registration link: Sign Up Here
Read the event concept note here
Together, we can ensure that the women who have the answers are heard.
