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After two years of organizing the LAND-at-scale Exchange in Utrecht, the third LAND-at-scale exchange took place from June 9th to June 13th in Uganda, hosted by LAS partner UN-Habitat/ Global Land Tool Network. Nearly 60 LAS country and knowledge partners came together in Kampala to exchange lessons learned and explore common challenges. As of 2024, twelve country projects are being implemented under the LAS program, namely Burkina Faso, Burundi, Chad, Colombia, Egypt, Iraq, Mali, Mozambique, the Palestinian Territories, Somalia, Rwanda and Uganda. All countries were represented and all implementing partners were present at the Exchange.
Learning is an integral part of the LAND-at-scale program. Exchanging among project partners is not only meant to learn and gather inspiration, but also serves as a way of fostering solidarity among project implementers in the challenges they face to secure land rights for men, women and youth in their respective contexts. For this reason, the LAS program organizes annual in-person exchanges, followed up by quarterly virtual exchanges among the project implementers. Last year, the discussions were centered around ‘scaling’. This year, the LAS partners jointly reflected on ‘Partnerships for Sustainable Change’.
This Exchange was organized in Uganda and allowed project implementers to visit a LAS project site. After the field visit, the LAS partners joined the broader Uganda Learning Week on Successful CSO-Government Partnerships, which RVO co-organized together with the International Land Coalition and the Government of Uganda. During this Learning Week, the exchanges were broadened with a wider group of representatives from CSOs, research institutions but notably also government representatives. A conclusion from the very first LAS exchange in 2022 was that talking with government instead of about government is a crucial element of achieving structural change in land governance.
The objectives of this third LAS exchange were to:
- Foster a sense of community among the LAS partners.
- Update all partners on the progress of LAS interventions and results, including the presentation of four new projects added to the LAS portfolio.
- Share between project partners on results so far and exchange on (common) challenges and/or lessons learned.
- Facilitate interactive and in-depth learning among project partners on key themes for adaptive programming and strengthening interventions.
- Visit LAS project site to learn more about land governance interventions in Uganda and become inspired.
This LAS exchange report summarizes key take-aways and actions from the discussions during the LAS Exchange as part of the Uganda Learning Week to promote successful governments and CSOs Partnerships in the land governance sector.