Globally, about 2 billion people claim ownership of their homes and lands through a customary tenure system. Customary tenure has long been insecure and is under growing pressure in many places. But it is also increasingly recognized through a variety of mechanisms, formal and informal. RECOFTC released a new report on the recognition of customary tenure of communities living in forested landscapes in Cambodia, Lao People’s Democratic Republic, Myanmar and Viet Nam. It also includes a case study from Thailand.

This manual aims to provide practical guidance on how communities can prepare for and decide whether to
support investments and is meant to be used along with the Introductory Guide for Communities, Governments and Investors. It has been written for all three RGIL countries, hoping that it will also be useful for other countries.

Approximately 1.6 billion people live in and around forest areas and use forest and land resources for their livelihoods: an estimated 36% of intact forests are within Indigenous Peoples lands. Clarifying land and resource rights and community forest management is critical for sustainable management of forests and natural resources, safeguarding livelihoods and supporting economic development. At COP26, a joint-donor Pledge was announced committing $1.7 billion to advance IPLC forest tenure rights from 2021 to 2025.

The Future of Open Data flows from a multi-year Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council (SSHRC) Partnership Grant project that set out to explore open government geospatial data from an interdisciplinary perspective. Researchers on the grant adopted a critical social science perspective grounded in the imperative that the research should be relevant to government and civil society partners in the field.

The formalization of community forest tenure rights is expected to promote sustainable community forest management, and is seen as a way to combine objectives related to environmental conservation, livelihood improvement, and local self-determination. However, the formalization of forest tenure rights by itself, does not automatically result in the intended impacts. There is a need to better understand the conditions under which communities are able to use these rights to achieve positive outcomes across multiple dimensions.

Seconde partie d’une étude en deux volets sur les politiques de l’habitat dans les pays à revenu intermédiaire, ce papier de recherche explore les alternatives aux programmes d’accession à la propriété pleine et individuelle (via un crédit immobilier). Dans le champ d’action des politiques publiques, ces alternatives peuvent aller de la mise en œuvre des formes d’accès à la propriété plus inclusives (autoconstruction partielle et encadrée, coopératives, foncier solidaire, etc.) à la relance des marchés locatifs privés et au développement du logement locatif social.