In many countries, unidentified private individuals and legal entities obtain significant economic benefits from land. This lack of transparency can make it harder for affected communities and governments to hold them accountable for land use decision-making and any sort of violation they commit. It can also leave investors open to risk if they do not know who is truly behind a company they are doing business with. 

This report analyses the land registration system and applicable legal framework in Sierra Leone to determine whether these ensure adequate transparency and accountability, particularly in the context of beneficial ownership.

أضحت حيازة الأراضي سيئة التنظيم مشكلة أساسية، خاصة في أفريقيا جنوب الصحراء الكبرى وجنوب شرق آسيا، حيث تهدد الأمن الغذائي وسبل كسب العيش المحلية وإدارة الموارد الطبيعية بطريقة مستدامة، وأثارت نزاعات حول الأراضي والتعدي على حقوق الإنسان. والمجموعات الاجتماعية المهمشة مهددة بصفة خاصة، بما في ذلك السكان الأصليون، وغيرهم من أصحاب الأراضي العرفيين، والنساء، الطبقات الدنيا، والأقليات العرقية.

Statutory recognition of rural communities as collective owners of their lands is substantial, expanding, and an increasingly accepted element of property relations. The conventional meaning of property in land itself is changing, allowing for a greater diversity of attributes without impairing legal protection.

This study draws on some case studies of land reforms in different South Asian countries. These reforms came on the national and international agenda in a major way in the post- World-War II period and were led by the transition theory, requiring agriculture to provide both surplus and labor for the growth of a modern industrial economy and leading to focus on efficiency in agricultural production (which would release resources -capital and labor- for investment in the modern industrial sector), rather than on distribution.

Goal 5 of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) “Achieve

For rural women and men, land is often the most important household asset for supporting agricultural production and providing food security and nutrition. Evidence shows that secure land tenure is strongly associated with higher levels of investment and productivity in agriculture – and therefore with higher incomes and greater economic wellbeing. Secure land rights for women are often correlated with better outcomes for them and their families, including greater bargaining power at household and community levels, better child nutrition and lower levels of gender-based violence.

This booklet reveals that women only got 103,043 titles representing 10.3 percent, while men got 865,095 titles representing 86.5 percent of the total. The glaring disparity is made clear when looked at against the actual land sizes and titled for women against men. The data sample shows that out of 10,129,704 hectares of land titled between 2013 and 2017 women got 163,253 hectares representing a paltry 1.62 while men got 9,903,304 hectares representing 97.76 percent.

This note is for private sector project implementers and financers (development finance institutions, international development agencies, commercial lenders and equity investors) seeking to invest responsibly in new greenfield sites in low and middle- income countries. It aims to provide practical guidance on identifying and addressing community land conflicts to prevent them escalating into disputes between the project and local communities.

Land – its access, control and ownership – lies at the heart of power relationships within Uganda. The struggle for land is deeply intertwined with the struggle for women’s rights. Women’s access to and control over resources and economic decision making is fundamental to the achievement of their rights. Despite some progress, inequality between women and men in ownership and control of land remains stark. Women’s rights organisations (WROs) in Uganda have identified changing patterns of land use as a major problem affecting women across the country.

Community Land Scotland (CLS) has today published ‘Towards Land Ownership Transparency in Scotland’, part of a larger study led by Transparency International to test a framework for assessing land ownership transparency within countries.  The framework was presented at ‘Land Governance in an Interconnected World’, the Annual World Bank Conference on Land and Poverty in Washington DC on March 20^th.

The report was prepared for Community Land Scotland by Poppea Daniel, an independent researcher.   It concludes:

Inequities in land ownership and access are possibly one of the most common injustices that have persisted in Uganda since the pre-colonial times. Unfair land use policies and practices and the lack of security of tenure must be immediately addressed if Uganda is to achieve its development goals under the National Development Plan II and most of the Sustainable Development Goals.

Oxfam is working in Uganda together with partners to address the drivers of extreme inequality and injustice such as Land.