Millions of people worldwide depend on natural resources such as land, fisheries and forests that are used collectively as commons. Commons are essential to culture, identity and well-being. As a source of food and income, they are an important safety-net, especially for the most marginalized and vulnerable people. The Voluntary Guidelines on the Responsible Governance of Tenure of Land, Fisheries and Forests in the Context of National Food Security provide a historic opportunity to recognize and secure tenure rights to commons.

Asks how can poor people protect their land rights? Stresses importance of land in the social, economic and political life of Africa and fact that land is contested all over Africa, with women’s rights particularly at risk. Land registration is inaccessible to most. African governments have often muddied the water, with land frequently used to reward political loyalty. The commons are especially important for poorer people, but everywhere are under growing pressure as privatisation and enclosure continue.

The lobby to industrialise food production in Africa is changing seed and land laws across the continent to serve agribusiness corporations. The end goal is to turn what has long been held as a commons into a marketable commodity that the private sector can control and extract profit from at the expense of smallholder farmers and communities. This survey aims to provide an overview of just who is pushing for which specific changes in these areas – looking not at the plans and projects, but at the actual texts that will define the new rules.

The webinar on the Land Reform Agenda for Kenya took place on 10 October, 2018. The webinar reviewed the land reform process in Kenya and addressed a range of challenges, with a view to defining a path forward that will lead to equity and justice in land reforms.

The webinar addressed the following questions: 

The Department of Agriculture Forestry and Fisheries (DAFF) and the Department of Rural Development and Land Reform (DRDLR) jointly presented on the implementation of the One District, One Agri-Park programme in the context of the framework of the rural economic transformation model.

El presente trabajo forma parte de un acumulado de acciones y luchas colectivas que venimos desarrollando las organizaciones sociales Consejo Cívico de Organizaciones Populares e Indígenas de Honduras (COPINH), Organización Fraternal Negra Hondureña (OFRANEH) y Jubileo Sur Américas (JS/A), y ha contado con el apoyo técnico del Transnational Institute (TNI).

The framework for analyzing sustainability of social-ecological systems (SES) framework of Elinor Ostrom is a multitier collection of concepts and variables that have proven to be relevant for understanding outcomes in diverse SES. The first tier of this framework includes the concepts resource system (RS) and resource units (RU), which are then further characterized through lower tier variables such as clarity of system boundaries and mobility.

This study analyses the approach of 'enclosing forests' implemented under the Project in Rajasthan which aimed at protecting and regenerating forests and securing long-term access of and benefits to local communities. Forest enclosures established in 13 villages of Udaipur and Baran districts and covering 1289 hectares of forest land represent a collaboration between local communities, the Forest

A major gap in understanding the situation in India with respect to land and its control is the takeover of common lands, which rarely figures in discourses on land. The Society for Promotion of Wastelands Development (SPWD, New Delhi) and RRI commissioned case studies on the takeover of common lands in India in an attempt to fill this gap. This paper is a compilation of those studies. Based on these case studies, an international conference was held in December 2012 to reflect the current situation and discuss possible policy actions.

The study is an attempt to bring to  the fore a Commons perspective of agriculture,livestock and rural   livelihoods  in  the  dryland and tribal areas of  India.  Would  agriculture,  livestock and  rural livelihoods sustain in  the absence  of the support  provided  by  Commons.

In finding an answer to this,  This explores  the potential role of  the Commons (land and  water resources)  in strengthening the  viability  of the agro‐pastoral production  systems and the resilience of  household livelihoods.

The  study  looks  into  the  work  of  two  organizations-  the  Foundation  for  Ecological Security (FES) and BAIF Research Foundation, towards Common Land Developmentin the two States of Rajasthan and Madhya Pradesh.

Following a chaotic political decolonization, from 1975 to 2000, the Comoros failed to sustain the extension of private land ownership pursued since the beginning of the twentieth century and to implement land reform prepared with the assistance of the FAO and the UNDP but abandoned after the assassination of the President of the Republic in 1989. This reform was based on a form of heritage management recognizing the plural and complementary nature of modes of securing land tenure.