By Anastasia Moloney
OVEJAS, Colombia, June 4 (Thomson Reuters Foundation) – Forced to flee her home to escape violence during Colombia’s half-century civil war, farmer Diana Vitola has been waiting decades to receive a formal document proving she is the lawful owner of a small plot of land.
Living in the former war-torn municipality of Ovejas in northern Colombia, Vitola belongs to a farming community set to receive nearly 3,000 land and property titles, making this the first area where most land is formalized.
“We’ve been waiting years for this,” said 45-year-old Vitola, who grows maize and cassava.
“As a woman, it’s really exciting. Before women were marginalized. Now we can appear somewhere on a document. We feel important, that we have rights.”
“For the past 18 months, government officials have been visiting farms and thatched adobe homes in Ovejas on foot measuring, surveying and identifying plots of land.
Farmers now have the chance to register their property with the national land registry and receive formal titles for free.
