Contains overview of the land reform process and brief summaries of presentations made on: key elements and guiding principles in formulating land policy; political, economic, social and cultural issues on the land policy and land law reform process; implications of gearing the formulation of land policy and land laws as a stimulus for agricultural productivity; gaps, conflicts, contradictions, overlaps and inconsistencies in the existing land laws and what needs to be done in land legal reform.

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.

Focuses on the problems of implementing new land laws in Africa, with particular emphasis on those in Tanzania, Uganda and South Africa. Includes background, the policy environment, implementers, accommodative non-state land reform, and radical non-state land reform.

Investigates the complex relationships between the decentralisation reform and implementation of the 1999 land laws in the rural areas of Tanzania. Considers the political implications of the neo-liberal citizenship model the reform tries to promote at the local level, with a particular focus on its link with the implementation of the Village Land Act of 1999. Concludes that these policies will have far-reaching effects on resource access and democracy at the local level.

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 paper discusses Cambodia’s legal framework relating to Economic Land Concessions (ELCs) and looks at the implementation gaps. It argues that despite Cambodian’s legal framework governing land and ELCs being well-developed, its social benefits, such as protecting the rights of the poor and vulnerable and contributing to transparency and accountability, are almost non-existent.

The draft National Land Use Policy (NLUP) that was unveiled for public comment in October 2014 intends to create a clear national framework for managing land in Myanmar. This is a very important step for Myanmar, given the fundamental importance of land policy for any society – particularly those with recent and complex histories of political and armed conflict and protracted displaced populations. With 70% of Myanmar’s population living and working in rural areas, agriculture is a fundamental part of the country’s social and economic fabric.

Since small-scale farmers manage most of the cultivated land worldwide, the ongoing shift in systems of production associated with large-scale land acquisitions (LSLAs) may dramatically reshape the world's agrarian landscape, significantly impacting rural populations and their livelihoods. The societal, hydrological and environmental implications resulting from the expansion of large-scale agricultural production, through LSLAs, make their ultimate sustainability questionable.

The UNFCCC framework asks countries to include a national REDD+ institutional framework with certain key elements, many of which will draw on existing legal frameworks. For example, as part of their national strategies and action plans (discussed above), countries are requested to address. land tenure issues:1 The importance of land tenure for regulating land use and assigning benefits from REDD+ has been widely noted. Nonetheless, clarifying and then administering land tenure is a complicated issue that presents a challenge for many countries.

The Land Portal Foundation, Landesa and the Sustainable Development Institute (SDI) co-facilitated a discussion on Liberia’s Land Rights Bill between July 18 and August 8, 2018. The discussion took place in collaboration with the Rights & Rice Foundation, Habitat for Humanity, and the Land Rights Now campaign. 

The full dialogue can be read here.

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: 

This guide provides step-by-step instructions on establishing and operating a paralegal or other community-based program to help people obtain legal identity documents. It is primarily for people designing and managing community-based paralegal projects to help clients access documentary proof of citizenship and other forms of proof of legal identity, such as birth certificates.