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We  rise for our Land is a film that explores the complexities and contentions of land struggles in 3 countries in Southern Africa- Eswatini ( formerly known as Swaziland), Mozambique and Zambia. In the film the protagonists are women activists, rural women who work the land and also mobilise for laws to be reviewed with rural women at the centre. In huge weight is the presence of leader members of the Southern Africa Rural Women\’s Assembly (RWA), which is a self-organised alliance of national rural women’s movements, assemblies, grassroots organisations and chapters of mixed peasant unions, federations and movements across ten countries in the SADC region, including the three countries illuminated. This year, as a way to mark the International Day of Rural Women and World Food Day celebrations, the RWA theme is – Land, Water and Food NOW! It is apt as we close the month of celebration and action on Land, Water, Food, to have this film launched as a screening and discussion which centres the rural women who are the true guardians of land, life, seeds and love.  It has been ten years of the Rural Women\’s Assembly working towards Land for women, and this film helps highlight and explain the complexities that meets this struggle especially in light of the global pandemic, COVID-19, which increases issues of food insecurity and Hunger, heightened inequality, and agitated climate change and leaves countries in the region  and especially rural women more vulnerable to dire poverty that can be overturned.

It is in collaborations like these, where visual visionaries like Azania Rizing Productions and institutions like the Sam Moyo African Institute for Agrarian Studies, really helps further the struggle the Land, by creating consciousness and awareness of the impact and role Rural Women play in the cycle to bring about land ownership, food security, sustainability and climate resilience.