ABSTRACTED FROM EXECUTIVE SUMMARY: Land rights systems in Southeast Asia are in constant flux; they respond to various socioeconomic and political pressures and to changes in statutory and customary law. Over the last decade, Southeast Asia has become one of the hotspots of the global land grab phenomenon, accounting for about 30 percent of transnational land grabs globally. Land grabs by domestic urban elites, the military or government actors are also common in many Southeast Asian countries.

The desperate search for ways to combat climate change gives rise to new mitigation policies and projects, with questionable impacts on people and the environment. Among these mitigation projects is the increasing support of large-scale ‘sustainable’ forestry plantations as part of the broader Clean Development Mechanisms. This paper discusses several problems that may arise from such plantation projects, especially the missed mitigation potential through the involvement of local actors in protecting biodiverse forests.

WEBSITE INTRODUCTION: This book examines large-scale land acquisitions, or ‘land grabbing’, with a focus on South-East Asia. Thematic papers and detailed case studies put this phenomenon into specific historical and institutional contexts, analysing transformations in livelihoods, human rights impacts, and potential remedies.

The purpose of the report is to provide documentary evidence of land disputes recorded throughout 2015. This evidence was gathered from articles on land disputes from local printed media, meetings with Land and Housing Right Network (LAHRiN) members, and through on-site data collection. This report aims to raise awareness and understanding of the current situation regarding land disputes, and act as a resource for other stakeholders working on land issues including government officials, donors, LAHRiN members, Cambodian and international civil society and academic researchers.

Poverty reduction has become a worldwide promise, yet the term itself has been commonly abused to legitimize development policies and projects with truly questionable impacts on the poor. This article critically reflects on how claims of poverty reduction through agricultural development have been turned into tactics of land capture in Cambodia.

This policy brief presents the main findings of a situational analysis and assessment of women’s and youth’s ability to access community land in Turkana County, Kenya, with a focus on their rights. The brief highlights the fact that even though policy and legal frameworks provide for equal rights and nondiscrimination in access to land, women and youth still face many land-related challenges in Turkana County. It looks at the current situation regarding community land rights and examines the bar riers that women face trying to realize these rights.

À travers le monde, des millions de personnes dépendent des ressources naturelles telles que les terres, les pêches et les forêts, qui sont utilisées collectivement comme des biens communs. Les biens communs sont essentiels à la culture, à l’identité et au bien-être. Source de nourriture et de revenus, ils agissent comme un important filet de sécurité, surtout pour les populations les plus marginalisées et les plus vulnérables.

Millones de personas de todo el mundo dependen de recursos naturales, como la tierra, la pesca y los bosques, que se utilizan de manera colectiva como propiedades comunales. Estas son fundamentales para la cultura, el bienestar y la identidad cultural. Como fuente de alimentos e ingresos, constituyen una importante red de seguridad, en particular para las personas más vulnerables y marginadas.

Here, more than 100 years of incumbency reports on officers of the irrigation bureaucracy of Punjab, Pakistan, are presented and analyzed. The data highlight how representation changed before and after partition within the irrigation bureaucracy. The data show that the irrigation bureaucracy increased through staffing its representation of local communities and is in its appointments responsive to elected representatives. Therefore, it is argued that empowerment of the local community can be achieved without irrigation management transfer but through the irrigation bureaucracy itself.

This article describes the indicators of the base of cadastral value and their main influencing factors. The base of cadastral value for residential building is summarised and analysed in Latvia municipalities and its territorial units in 2015. The analysis results showed areas with the highest and lowest base of cadastral value for residential building in municipalities of Latvia. Also grouping and analysis of municipalities by the maximum and minimum base of cadastral value for residential building land in rural areas were carried out.

The contemporary rural residential area system formed under specific circumstances characteristic to a particular region and under historic, economic, politic and social details of residential area development. This article studies the influence of natural factors to the formation of rural residential area system, discusses the problem of residential area vanishing and the factors that influence the development of current residential areas.