An analysis of the gendered impacts of commercial pressures on land, based on a review of the literature and ILC’s country case studies, including Ethiopia, Zambia, Rwanda and Benin. In the present global context of increasing pressures, women are both likely to be affected differently to men by large-scale land deals and disproportionately more likely to be negatively affected than men because they are generally vulnerable as a group.

An article and radio talk replete with photos concerning a story of land grabbing in the village of Ruasse, Zambezia, northern Mozambique by a Portuguese company, Quifel. By law, companies are supposed to negotiate with communities, but no company seems to be taking the law seriously. The case also cited in the Norfolk & Hanlon World Bank presentation of April 2012.

Includes trends prospects and policies, biofuel production and land access in Tanzania – laws, policies and procedures, impacts of biofuel investments on land access. Findings and implications cover production models and their impacts on local land access; risks of land alienation – long term impacts; limitations of compensation; use of third-party mediators?; large-scale transfers of land for biofuels are most problematic; linking policy with practice; shortcomings of biofuel guidelines; alternative land holding structures and production models.

A five and a half minute video demonstrating that from cookies and ice cream to soap and shampoo, every second product in supermarkets contains palm oil. New oil plantations grab land and destroy the environment in e.g. Sierra Leone. Demonstrates that there is also a fair and environmentally friendly alternative way.

Examines the literature on Uganda’s tenure systems, including the legal and administrative frameworks and their implementation at the local level, analyses the relations between these elements and tenure security and discusses ways in which land may relate to economic activities. Implementation of reforms has been slow and partial. The literature shows that the division of labour between land administration institutions at the different administrative levels is not clearly spelled out and that they are often inaccessible at the local level.

Paper reviews the South African experience with land reform, and land redistribution in particular, up to the end of 2005. Looks at various aspects of market-based land reform – landowner veto on participation in land reform; payment of ‘market prices’ for land; self-selection of beneficiaries; focus on ‘commercial’ forms of production; prominent role for the private sector in provision of credit, extension, and other services.

Focuses on tenure reform (as a necessary first step); securing rights for farmworkers and labour tenants; slow progress and key challenges in restitution; redistribution; what is to be done? Offers an overview of the key challenges facing land reform and suggests a number of ways in which the current reform programme can be accelerated to fight poverty and inequality. Argues there is urgent need for a comprehensive, transparent, participatory process and for widespread public debate, especially in the light of events in Zimbabwe.

Host governments seeking to address the grievances of people adversely affected by land-based investments must navigate a complicated landscape of legal obligations and pragmatic considerations. Provides an overview of practical solutions for governments confronting land grievances, considered in the context of the constraints and obligations imposed by international investment law, international human rights law, domestic law, and investor-state contracts.

Inclusive business models have attracted renewed interest as part of wider debates about growing agricultural investment in developing countries. Report discusses joint ventures in South Africa’s agricultural sector. The South African experience features major specificities linked to the country’s history and recent land reform programme. Land reform beneficiaries entered into a range of joint ventures with commercial partners.

Series of country papers on HIV/AIDS and land in Lesotho, Kenya, Malawi, South Africa, Tanzania, with concluding paper on methodological and conceptual issues. The key questions addressed include: The impact on and changes in land tenure systems (including patterns of ownership, access, and rights) as a consequence of HIV/AIDS with a focus on vulnerable groups. The ways that HIV/AIDS affected households are coping in terms of land use, management and access, e.g. abandoning land due to fear of losing land, renting out due to inability to utilise land, distress sale of land, etc.

Highlights the role of European Development Finance Institutions (DFIs) in possible land grabs and questionable forestry projects in Africa. Documents 9 cases involving 8 of the European DFIs in Cameroon, DR Congo, Sao Tome, Sierra Leone, Tanzania and Uganda. Raises the need for more independent research into these projects and for much more scrutiny of DFI investment portfolios, both by DFIs themselves and national parliaments. DFIs need to be placed under proper democratic scrutiny and their investments held to account by parliaments.

Studies the complex linkages between land governance and how they relate directly and indirectly to local food security in Kenya, Tanzania, Uganda and Ethiopia. Found that floriculture investments have both negative and positive impacts through land use changes and land acquisition processes, job creation and employment conditions and technology and knowledge transfers.