Discusses highlights from a recent academic article exploring whether 3,000 bilateral and regional investment treaties protect ‘land grab’ deals and how these impact the land rights of rural people. Argues that, if not properly thought through, international treaties to protect foreign investment could compound shortcomings of local and national governance, undermining the rights of people impacted by the investments.

The Kilimanjaro Initiative is a rural women’s mobilisation from across Africa towards an iconic moment at the foot of Mt Kilimanjaro in October 2016. Objectives include raising awareness on existing frameworks and safeguards around large scale land based initiatives and demand for their application in securing legitimate tenure rights of rural women in Africa. Presents a charter of demands and recommendations.

The project aims to create actionable policy proposals to make spaces of participation more effective in five countries in Latin America, and to contribute to the needs of existing social movements within their local contexts. Currently the study is mapping specific effects of implementation of participatory reforms on the distribution of power and resources in communities, the pathways through which such effects are produced, the accountability of domestic decision-makers, and impacts on successive iterations of legal reform.

While scholars long recognized the importance of land markets as a key driver of rural non-farm development and transformation in rural areas, evidence on the extent of their operation and the nature of participants remains limited. We use household data from 6 countries to show that there is great potential for such markets to increase productivity and equalize factor ratios. While rental markets transfer land to land-poor and labor-rich producers, their operation and thus impact may be constrained by policy restrictions.

A new report offers evidence that the modest investments needed to secure land rights for indigenous communities will generate billions in returns—economically, socially and environmentally—for local communities and the world’s changing climate. The report, Climate Benefits, Tenure Costs: The Economic Case for Securing Indigenous Land Rights, quantifies for the first time the economic value of securing land rights for the communities who live in and protect forests, with a focus on Colombia, Brazil, and Bolivia.

Oxfam is deeply concerned about the worsening levels of violence, murder and repression against the men and women defending human rights in Latin America. This situation is linked to an economic model that fosters extreme inequality and has a negative impact on people’s basic rights.

It is the result of harassment entrenched in a patriarchal culture, and governments' failure to fulfil their human rights obligations –and the influence of powerful groups on governments that limits their role as guarantors of human rights for their citizens.

This guide aims to help local organisations, communities and governments to carry out constructive, peaceful engagement and negotiation with companies and government, with the aim of achieving sustainable development and improved quality of life. Its main objectives are:

Impact of an intervention by the Rwanda Initiative for Sustainable Development (RISD) in contributing to the implementation of pro-poor and equitable land policies. Through evidence-based awareness raising efforts, dialogue, advocacy and networking, RISD was able to influence policy implementation and promote the land rights of poor and vulnerable groups, including women. 

A brief on the need to secure land rights for the world’s pastoralists, who manage rangelands that cover a quarter of the world’s land surface but have few advocates. Covers the different paths pastoralists take; resource scarcity in the face of uncertainty; pastoralism and land use; loss and fragmentation of pastoralist lands and blocking of livestock routes; managing climatic variability and climate change; initiatives for securing pastoralists rights to land (Niger, Tanzania, India, Ethiopia).

Land Economics/Use,