Gender and development
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Without any risk of exaggeration, the African society can still be regarded today as deeply phallocratic. The rights of possession, administration, property management and decision belong mainly to men. Women on the contrary have obligations and duties to procreate, keep, maintain, carry out, obey, etc. They can enjoy the fruit of their work only under the leadership of a man who can be the father, the brother or the husband. In terms of striking the balance between rights and duties, the balance weighs heavily in favour of man. It is clear that in such context, the woman is not only disadvantaged, but she is seen as an object.
Faithful to her Christian principles and her engagement for justice, peace and the safeguard of the creation, CIPCRE cannot speak about dignity and the promotion of mankind without being interested particularly in the man/woman relationship. With this in mind, CIPCRE chose the approach Gender and Development, which allows her to follow a contextual analysis, to show that the roles allotted to men and women, and often considered wrongly as natural, come from a cultural process and can, consequently, be modified. Concretely, through all actions undertaken on the field, CIPCRE seeks to balance the loads of rights with those of duties between men and women, in particular in the division of roles and access of women to resources, the equitable sharing of the fruits of common work and of decision-making.
 The right to a voice and responsibilities
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The gender and development approach, chosen by CIPCRE, already bears fruits in the Western and North-Western regions of Cameroon. Following many sensitization meetings among partner farmer organizations of CIPCRE in the regions, a constructive dialogue between men and women is gradually settling. It is encouraging to note that women rely more and more on themselves, regularly speak during board management meetings of their farmer organizations, and take more and more responsibilities and decision-making in these committees. In spite of their modesty, an attentive observer will measure the importance of these small projections, more especially as we are located in a context where ancestral traditions succeeded in installing mechanisms of ragging and of exploitation of women, such as widowhood and the exclusion from the land property or the succeeding a dead relative.
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Access and control of resources and profits
The reduction of arable spaces, noted in particular in the West and North-West provinces of Cameroon, has lead to a notable regression of the status of the woman. Indeed, the reduction of natural resources due to human pressure, has made it such that the little profits that women obtained for a long period, is today threatened. Because of that, CIPCRE in her agro-forestry project has committed herself to support the participation of women in the activities of planting trees. This is extremely significant, when it is known that, in the West province, women do not have the right to plant trees, because they are not land owners. To circumvent this social practice, CIPCRE made sure that throughout the process, women are not only implicated, but that they can put forward their practical needs and their strategic interests. With this in mind, reflection workshops with recipients, administrative and traditional authorities were organised, at the end of which women learned that a person who plants trees, whether a man or a woman, becomes at the same time the owner of the planted trees as well as of the plots on which these trees are planted. However, these plots cannot be assigned to another use apart from the forestation.
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Equity in access to employment
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Within the framework of the Gender and Development approach, CIPCRE is not just satisfied to preach to others. It takes care in order to lay a particular emphasize in carrying out its activities, on the practical needs and strategic interests of women. In addition, it attaches a great importance to the search of a balance, regarding the composition of the members of deliberative and controlling authorities, such as the attribution of responsibilities within the executive body. On a purely illustrative basis, among the nine members of the board of governors, four are obligatorily women. Moreover, out of the six coordinators of the operational units of CIPCRE-Cameroon, three are women.
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