Study title

The goal of the project is to assess the impact of the latest land laws and administrative reforms in Southern Ethiopia. Land certificates are being distributed jointly to husbands and wives in a setting where women have traditionally had very limited rights and have been regarded as property of their husbands. The project aims to evaluate how the reform has influenced the participation and bargaining power of husbands and wives in land-related decisions, the extent of intra-household and family conflicts regarding land, and the outcomes of such conflicts. Additionally, the project will examine how the reform has affected land allocation during marital changes and the valuation of land/property. The research will be conducted in two regions in Southern Ethiopia where joint land certificates have been issued to husbands and wives since 2005. Women have traditionally held a weak position in this part of Ethiopia, and the transition from being the husband's property to being an equal owner can therefore be long and challenging. The individual data collection includes questions to assess the participation and decision-power of men and women in landrelated issues, knowledge of the law, perceptions, opinions and experience questions such as experiences of land-related disputes. In addition a bargaining game experiment will be used to assess how far apart independent and joint decisions of husbands and wives turn out and to compare this with their real life decisions. Another experiment will be used to assess whether there is an 'endowment effect' causing men to value the land more than their wives and therefore being unwilling to give it up. Key in formants such as local conflict mediators will be used assess the extent of within family disputes and the legal support provided to handle such disputes.