Land policies are of fundamental importance to sustainable growth, good governance, and the well-being of, and the economic opportunities open to, both rural and urban dwellers - particularly the poor. To this end, research on land policy, and analysis of interventions related to the subject, have long been of interest to the Bank's Research Department, and other academic, and civil society institutions.

This BMZ comissioned report by GTZ highlights the dramatic increase of land concessions and rising inequality in land distribution in Cambodia. Parts of the study refer to an earlier report by Uch Sophas “Foreign Direct Investment in Land for Biomass Production in Cambodia”. The South-East Asian country Cambodia has an area of 181,035 km2. The Government of Cambodia is adapting its activities to attract FDI, which has lead to a steady increase especially since 2007.

La Coalition Internationale sur les Terres (ILC) pense qu’un suivi raisonnable et efficace des conversions et de la fragmentation en cours des ecosystèmes de parcours est indispensable pour permettre une compréhension approfondie des tendances actuelles et de leurs implications, et également pour promouvoir une prise de décisions avisée et participative sur, d’une part, l'utilisation de la terres et les investissements dans les parcours et, d’autre part, sur les compromis qui en découlent.

Au cours de l’année 2012, il est apparu clairement que les pays en voie de développement devaient faire un choix fondamental. Opteraient-ils pour un développement basé sur l’inclusion, le respect de la loi et des droits de leurs citoyens ? Ou chercheraient-ils un moyen rapide d’accéder au développement en cédant la terre et les ressources naturelles des communautés aux investisseurs internationaux et aux élites nationales ? Transformeraient-ils leurs propriétaires fonciers en paysans sans terre ?

En 2009, l’UE s’est fixé comme objectif de porter à 10 % la part des énergies renouvelables dans sa consommation énergétique d’ici 2020. Dans le secteur des transports, cela s’est traduit par une législation qui promeut l’utilisation des carburants d’origine végétale : les agrocarburants.

ABSTRACTED FROM THE OBJECTIVES SECTION: These Voluntary Guidelines seek to improve governance of tenure of land*, fisheries and forests. They seek to do so for the benefit of all, with an emphasis on vulnerable and marginalized people, with the goals of food security and progressive realization of the right to adequate food, poverty eradication, sustainable livelihoods, social stability, housing security, rural development, environmental protection and sustainable social and economic development.

Political dynamics of the global land grab are exemplified in Cambodia, where at least 27 forced evictions took place in 2009, affecting 23,000 people. Evictions of the rural poor are legitimized by the assumption that non-private land is idle, marginal, or degraded and available for capitalist exploitation. This paper: (1) questions the assumption that land is idle; (2) explores whether land grabs can be regulated through a ‘code of conduct’; and (3) examines peasant resistance to land grabs.

ABSTRACTED FROM THE INTRODUCTION: This report shows how, contrary to Cambodia’s obligations under international human rights law, those affected by evictions have had no opportunity for genuine participation and consultation beforehand. Information on planned evictions and on resettlement packages has often been incomplete and inaccurate, undermining the right to information of those affected.

Source: Grain.org

Huit ans après la publication de son premier rapport sur l'accaparement des terres, qui a inscrit cette question à l'ordre du jour international, GRAIN publie un nouvel ensemble de données qui offre des précisions sur près de 500 cas d'accaparement des terres dans le monde entier.

The type of agrarian structure employed to produce tropical commodities affects many dimensions of land use, such as ownership inequality, overlapping land rights and conflicts, and land use changes. I conduct a literature review of historical changes in agrarian structures of commodities grown on the upland frontier of mainland Southeast and South Asia, using a case study approach, of tea, rubber, oil palm and cassava.

Rural change in Cambodia manifests itself in rapidly declining land availability for the smallholder sector, posing the question of how farmers may be able to deal with limited access to land. In this paper, we discuss with a case study village and household livelihood strategies of smallholders currently operating under land-constrained conditions. Based on an integrated assessment of a smallholder village in Kampot province, we illustrate in quantitative terms how land shortage is creating problems of surplus generation and liquidity issues in monetary and non-monetary flows.