Explore the global data below.
Related Materials
- REPORT | Resilience and Resistance: Indigenous, Afro-descendant, and Local Community Women’s Statutory Rights to Community Forests (2025)
- EXECUTIVE SUMMARY | Resilience and Resistance (2025)
- REPORT | At a Crossroads: Consequential Trends in Recognition of Community-Based Forest Tenure from 2002-2017 (2018)
- REPORT | A Global Baseline of Carbon Storage in Collective Lands (2018)
- REPORT | Power and Potential: A Comparative Analysis of National Laws and Regulations Concerning Women’s Rights to Community Forests (2017)
- New Depth of Rights Report coming in 2025
Methodology
- RRI’s Women’s Rights to Community Forests/Gender Methodology
- RRI’s Bundle of Rights Methodology
RRI’s Forest Tenure data tracks forest area under four tenure categories based on the rightsholder and strength of their rights under national law, employing a bundle of rights approach that links RRI’s qualitative and quantitative data.
Forest Area Data
Evidence from 58 countries covering nearly 92 percent of the world’s forests shows communities’ legal rights to own and manage forests increased from 2002 to 2017, with most of these gains occurring within 33 low- and middle-income countries in Africa, Asia, and Latin America. Yet, significant challenges in implementation remain and communities continue to contest lands controlled by governments and other actors.
Gender Data
Deeper analysis of the legal frameworks regulating community-based forest tenure in 35 countries shows that despite laudable international progress concerning the articulation of Indigenous, Afro-descendant, and local community women’s tenure rights and widespread constitutional protections for women’s equal rights, states are still failing to meet their legal obligations to legislatively protect women’s community-based forest tenure rights.
Across 104 legal frameworks analyzed from 35 countries that together cover about 80 percent of forests in Africa, Asia, and Latin America, specific recognition of women’s community-based forest tenure rights only improved marginally from 2016 to 2024.
Learn more below and read about the methodology for each dataset: Forest Area and Gender/Depth of Rights. New data for Depth of Rights is coming in 2025.
The methodology underlying this data is based on the bundle-of-rights approach for community-based tenure regimes (CBTRs).
A CBTR is a distinguishable set of national laws, regulations, and case law governing all situations under which the right to own or manage terrestrial natural resources is held at the community level.
CBTRs may be classified as “government administered;” “designated for Indigenous Peoples, Afro-descendant Peoples, and local communities;” or “owned by Indigenous Peoples, Afro-descendant Peoples, and local communities” based on the combination of rights recognized under a country’s national laws, regulations, or supreme or constitutional court decisions.
Read through RRI’s full methodologies for Forest Area and the Depth of Rights.
Explore country-level data on the distribution of Forest Tenure over time. Click on the country name to learn more about the legal frameworks recognizing community-based tenure, including the specific rights of Indigenous, Afro-descendant, and community women.
As of 2017, Indigenous Peoples and local communities are legally recognized as owning at least 447 million hectares (Mha), or 12.2 percent, of forestland within the 58 countries analyzed.
Country
Government Administered
2002 2017Designated for Indigenous Peoples, Afro-descendant Peoples, and Local Communities
2002 2017Owned by Indigenous Peoples, Afro-descendant Peoples, and Local Communities
2002 2017Privately Owned by Individuals and Firms
2002 2017Highlighting in gray indicates Complete Case Countries.
Dashes (-) denote situations in which the tenure category in question is not legally possible under national law.
n.d. = No Data
Source: RRI. 2018. At a Crossroads: Trends in Recognition of Community-Based Forest Tenure from 2002-2017.
RRI’s Gender database builds on RRI’s Depth of Rights analysis on the extent and strength of communities’ legally recognized forest tenure rights. The gender database captures qualitative data on Indigenous, Afro-descendant, and local community women’s legally recognized tenure rights to community forests under 104 community-based tenure regimes (CBTRs) legally recognized within 35 countries.
The CBTR underpins all of RRI’s Tenure Tracking methodologies and associated databases. A CBTR is a distinguishable set of national laws, regulations, and case law governing all situations under which the right to own or manage terrestrial natural resources is held at the community level.
- Legislative provisions adequately protecting the rights of community women exist for only 2 percent of CBTRs regarding Voting, 5 percent for Leadership, 13 percent for community-level Inheritance, 20 percent for Dispute Resolution, and 29 percent for Membership.
- Concerningly, the rights most pivotal for Indigenous, Afro-descendant, and local community women to shape their and their communities’ relationship with forests resources—Voting and Leadership—continue to receive the least amount of adequate protection under national law, thus limiting community women’s ability to challenge gender-discriminatory norms and meaningfully participate in key decisions impacting community territories.
- National legal frameworks that recognize community forest ownership, and those established with the primary goal of securing community rights (as compared to regimes established for conservation or resource extraction), provide the strongest protections for Indigenous, Afro-descendant, and local community women’s tenure rights—showing that the legal advancement of communities and community women can and does go hand in hand.
- Legal reforms that generally overlook or actively diminish community women’s forest tenure rights appear to be eroding the positive association between communities’ and community women’s forest tenure rights under national law.
Source: Rights and Resources Initiative. 2025. Resilience and Resistance: Indigenous, Afro-descendant, and Local Community Women’s Statutory Rights to Community Forests. Rights and Resources Initiative, Washington, DC. doi: 10.53892
Read RRI’s Gender and Depth of Rights Methodology.
RRI’s Gender Database builds on the Bundle of Rights to assess the extent to which the same 35 countries’ legal frameworks recognize Indigenous, Afro-descendant, and local community women’s specific rights to community forests, and whether those states are meeting their obligations under national and international laws. These frameworks, called community-based tenure regimes (CBTRs), are defined as distinguishable sets of national, state-issued laws and regulations governing “all situations under which the right to own or manage terrestrial natural resources is held at the community level.”
Learn more about RRI’s Gender Methodology.
- 2016
- 2024
- 2016 - Overarching Rights
- 2024 - Overarching Rights
Source: RRI. 2016. Depth of Rights Database.
Sources: RRI. 2016. Depth of Rights Database.
Sources: RRI. 2016. Depth of Rights Database.
Source: RRI. 2024. Depth of Rights Database.
Sources: RRI. 2024. Depth of Rights Database.
Sources: RRI. 2024. Depth of Rights Database.
- 2016 - CBTR-Specific Rights
- 2024 - CBTR-Specific Rights
Sources: RRI. 2016. Depth of Rights Database.
Sources: RRI. 2016. Depth of Rights Database.
Sources: RRI. 2016. Depth of Rights Database.
Sources: RRI. 2016. Depth of Rights Database.
Sources: RRI. 2016. Depth of Rights Database.
Sources: RRI. 2024. Depth of Rights Database.
Sources: RRI. 2024. Depth of Rights Database.
Sources: RRI. 2024. Depth of Rights Database.
Sources: RRI. 2024. Depth of Rights Database.
Sources: RRI. 2024. Depth of Rights Database.
RRI maintains detailed qualitative data on the strength of Forest Tenure rights legally held by Indigenous Peoples, Afro-descendant Peoples, and local communities in 35 countries in Africa, Asia, and Latin America. Learn more about RRI’s Bundle of Rights Methodology here.
- 2016
- 2024
Sources: RRI. 2016. Depth of Rights Database.
Sources: RRI. 2024. Depth of Rights Database.
RRI maintained detailed qualitative data on the strength of Forest Tenure rights legally held by Indigenous Peoples, Afro-descendant Peoples, and local communities in 35 countries in Africa, Asia, and Latin America. Learn more about RRI’s Bundle of Rights Methodology here.
- 2016
- 2024
Sources: RRI. 2016. Depth of Rights Database.
Sources: RRI. 2016. Depth of Rights Database.
Sources: RRI. 2016. Depth of Rights Database.
Sources: RRI. 2016. Depth of Rights Database.
Sources: RRI. 2016. Depth of Rights Database.
Sources: RRI. 2016. Depth of Rights Database.
Sources: RRI. 2016. Depth of Rights Database.
Sources: RRI. 2016. Depth of Rights Database.
Sources: RRI. 2016. Depth of Rights Database.
Sources: RRI. 2016. Depth of Rights Database.
Sources: RRI. 2024. Depth of Rights Database.
Sources: RRI. 2024. Depth of Rights Database.
Sources: RRI. 2024. Depth of Rights Database.
Sources: RRI. 2024. Depth of Rights Database.
Sources: RRI. 2024. Depth of Rights Database.
Sources: RRI. 2024. Depth of Rights Database.
Sources: RRI. 2024. Depth of Rights Database.
Sources: RRI. 2024. Depth of Rights Database.
Sources: RRI. 2024. Depth of Rights Database.
Sources: RRI. 2024. Depth of Rights Database.
Intro sentence about contextual indicators and how they’re used goes here. Intro sentence about contextual indicators and how they’re used goes here. Intro sentence about contextual indicators and how they’re used goes here.
Does national law recognize community-based rights to use any resources (timber, non-timber, water, and/or other) or areas for cultural and/or religious purposes? Cultural/religious use rights or areas may also be described as “traditional,” “customary,” “spiritual,” “sacred,” or in other similar terms.
- Global
- Regional Comparison
Sources: RRI. 2024. Depth of Rights Database.
Does national law guarantee FPIC rights for Indigenous Peoples, Afro-Descendant Peoples, or local communities — or their self-appointed representative institution — that are applicable to community forests?
- Global
- Regional Comparison
Sources: RRI. 2024. Depth of Rights Database.
A legislative “land–water nexus” can provide a crucial legal foundation for community-based freshwater rights, particularly when countries’ water laws fail to consider or protect the specific rights and needs of Indigenous Peoples, Afro-descendant Peoples, and local communities. Findings demonstrate that the “land–water nexus” is often essential to supporting communities’ abilities to claim, protect, and realize their water tenure rights.
- Global
- Regional Comparison