diff --git a/config/functions b/config/functions
index fd37397c44..3449d58590 100644
--- a/config/functions
+++ b/config/functions
@@ -22,6 +22,11 @@ setup_toolchain() {
     export PKG_CONFIG_LIBDIR="$TARGET_PKG_CONFIG_LIBDIR"
     export PKG_CONFIG_SYSROOT_DIR="$TARGET_PKG_CONFIG_SYSROOT_DIR"
 
+  # set python defaults
+    export _python_sysroot="$SYSROOT_PREFIX"
+    export _python_prefix=/usr
+    export _python_exec_prefix=/usr
+
   # set CMAKE configfile for target
     export CMAKE_CONF=$ROOT/$TOOLCHAIN/etc/cmake-$TARGET_NAME.conf
 
diff --git a/packages/lang/Python/package.mk b/packages/lang/Python/package.mk
index cb3a88c70e..c8655f105a 100644
--- a/packages/lang/Python/package.mk
+++ b/packages/lang/Python/package.mk
@@ -31,7 +31,7 @@ PKG_SHORTDESC="python: The Python programming language"
 PKG_LONGDESC="Python is an interpreted object-oriented programming language, and is often compared with Tcl, Perl, Java or Scheme."
 
 PKG_IS_ADDON="no"
-PKG_AUTORECONF="no"
+PKG_AUTORECONF="yes"
 
 PY_DISABLED_MODULES="readline _curses _curses_panel _tkinter nis gdbm bsddb ossaudiodev"
 
@@ -77,10 +77,8 @@ make_host() {
        PYTHON_MODULES_LIB="$HOST_LIBDIR" \
        PYTHON_DISABLE_MODULES="$PY_DISABLED_MODULES"
 
-  sed -e "s|$ROOT/$TOOLCHAIN/include|$SYSROOT_PREFIX/usr/include|g" \
-      -e "s|$ROOT/$TOOLCHAIN/lib|$SYSROOT_PREFIX/usr/lib|g" \
-      -e "s|$ROOT/$TOOLCHAIN/bin/host-gcc|${TARGET_PREFIX}gcc|g" \
-      -i build/lib.linux-$(uname -m)-2.7/_sysconfigdata.py
+  # python distutils per default adds -L$LIBDIR when linking binary extensions
+    sed -e "s|^ 'LIBDIR':.*| 'LIBDIR': '/usr/lib',|g" -i $(cat pybuilddir.txt)/_sysconfigdata.py
 }
 
 makeinstall_host() {
@@ -120,10 +118,6 @@ makeinstall_target() {
         PYTHON_MODULES_LIB="$TARGET_LIBDIR" \
         install
 
-  # python distutils per default adds -L$LIBDIR when linking binary extensions
-  sed -e "s|^LIBDIR=.*|LIBDIR= $SYSROOT_PREFIX/usr/lib|" \
-      -i $SYSROOT_PREFIX/usr/lib/python*/config/Makefile
-
   make  -j1 CC="$TARGET_CC" \
         DESTDIR=$INSTALL \
         PYTHON_DISABLE_MODULES="$PY_DISABLED_MODULES" \
diff --git a/packages/lang/Python/patches/Python-2.7.11-008-distutils-use-python-sysroot.patch b/packages/lang/Python/patches/Python-2.7.11-008-distutils-use-python-sysroot.patch
new file mode 100644
index 0000000000..7cd748761a
--- /dev/null
+++ b/packages/lang/Python/patches/Python-2.7.11-008-distutils-use-python-sysroot.patch
@@ -0,0 +1,54 @@
+Adjust library/header paths for cross-compilation
+
+When cross-compiling third-party extensions, the get_python_inc() or
+get_python_lib() can be called, to return the path to headers or
+libraries. However, they use the sys.prefix of the host Python, which
+returns incorrect paths when cross-compiling (paths pointing to host
+headers and libraries).
+
+In order to fix this, we introduce the _python_sysroot, _python_prefix
+and _python_exec_prefix variables, that allow to override these
+values, and get correct header/library paths when cross-compiling
+third-party Python modules.
+
+The _python_sysroot variable is also used to prefix the LIBDIR value
+taken from the sysconfigdata module.
+
+Signed-off-by: Thomas Petazzoni <thomas.petazzoni@free-electrons.com>
+
+Index: b/Lib/distutils/sysconfig.py
+===================================================================
+--- a/Lib/distutils/sysconfig.py
++++ b/Lib/distutils/sysconfig.py
+@@ -19,8 +19,13 @@
+ from distutils.errors import DistutilsPlatformError
+ 
+ # These are needed in a couple of spots, so just compute them once.
+-PREFIX = os.path.normpath(sys.prefix)
+-EXEC_PREFIX = os.path.normpath(sys.exec_prefix)
++if "_python_sysroot" in os.environ:
++    _sysroot=os.environ.get('_python_sysroot')
++    PREFIX = os.path.normpath(_sysroot + os.environ.get('_python_prefix'))
++    EXEC_PREFIX = os.path.normpath(_sysroot + os.environ.get('_python_exec_prefix'))
++else:
++    PREFIX = os.path.normpath(sys.prefix)
++    EXEC_PREFIX = os.path.normpath(sys.exec_prefix)
+ 
+ # Path to the base directory of the project. On Windows the binary may
+ # live in project/PCBuild9.  If we're dealing with an x64 Windows build,
+Index: b/Lib/distutils/command/build_ext.py
+===================================================================
+--- a/Lib/distutils/command/build_ext.py
++++ b/Lib/distutils/command/build_ext.py
+@@ -237,7 +237,10 @@
+         if (sysconfig.get_config_var('Py_ENABLE_SHARED')):
+             if not sysconfig.python_build:
+                 # building third party extensions
+-                self.library_dirs.append(sysconfig.get_config_var('LIBDIR'))
++                libdir = sysconfig.get_config_var('LIBDIR')
++                if "_python_sysroot" in os.environ:
++                    libdir = os.environ.get("_python_sysroot") + libdir
++                self.library_dirs.append(libdir)
+             else:
+                 # building python standard extensions
+                 self.library_dirs.append('.')