Stresses views of conference participants that agrarian reform is an alive issue on the political agenda of many countries. A wide consensus on the positive contribution that more equal access to land and other assets makes to the fight against poverty. Meaningful reform must involve the transformation of property rights. Agrarian reform must involve state regulation to overcome the failure of markets to deliver equitable outcomes. Also a wide consensus on the need for strong and effective state action.

Since the 2005 Land Summit, new approaches to land reform have been on the agenda, yet there remains little clarity on the way forward. The main focus has been on means of accelerating the redistribution of land through new modes of acquiring land. Acquisition is an important matter but if treated in isolation risks mis-specifying the core problems evident in land reform in South Africa. A new phase of land reform located within a wider agrarian reform is needed and will require new institutional arrangements.

An executive summary and recommendations are followed by 5 chapters: on the land question, reform and farm workers; the scope and process of fast track reform; the impact of land reform on farm workers’ livelihoods; food security, vulnerable groups, HIV-AIDS and coping strategies; and after the ‘promised land’ – towards the future. Study reveals that by early 2003, only about 100,000 of the original c.320,000 farm workers were still employed on the farms, the others are jobless and landless and have lost their entitlement to housing, basic social services and subsidised food.

Revisits Zimbabwe’s land question 5 years after the launching of the ‘fast-track’ land redistribution programme which has created a new paradigm, the consequences of which will take many years to work through the country’s political, economic, and social fabric. Briefly defines old and new versions of Zimbabwe’s land question before outlining salient aspects of the reform process. Assesses the outcomes of the redistribution, the apparent lacuna between land and agrarian reform, and the debate the reform process has kindled.

Concluding chapter aiming to synthesise key findings of research papers and perspectives in a volume on land and livelihoods in Zimbabwe. Proposes a strategic policy roadmap in 4 phases for re-engaging government, donors and civil society in land and agrarian reform in Zimbabwe.

Highly condensed paper on gendered land rights, written principally for Oxfam staff and partners, and summarising some of the literature on Africa and elsewhere.

Report on a conference held in the Philippines in December 2000.

Contains mix-and-match ministries, separating Land Reform from Agriculture, dualism and the ‘missing middle’, rethinking rural development, what are the policy alternatives?

Includes a retrospective of 10 years of land reform, restitution, redistribution, farm tenure reform, communal tenure reform, debating the future of land and agrarian reform, conclusions. Argues that there is a need for the state to intervene to make suitable land available to meet local needs, rather than relying wholly on land markets.

This book is a compilation of 11 papers that explore the limits of the current approach to land redistribution in South Africa and propose policy alternatives. Centres on 3 themes: how land is to be acquired (which land, and for whom), under what tenure arrangements it is to be held, and how production is to be supported. Focus moves beyond debating alternatives to the ‘willing-buyer, willing-seller’ paradigm to the kind of agrarian change that land reform should pursue. Central to all is reconfiguring the roles of state and market.

Includes agri-food regimes and corporate concentration in the agri-food system in South Africa; three broad phases of land reform, 1994-99, 1999-2007, 2007 to the present; two competing views of small-scale agriculture, land reform and small-scale agricultural production, smallholder farmer support.

Looks at the institutional framework, at current key land policy and agrarian issues, and at the impact of land and agrarian reform. Makes a series of recommendations. Argues that the resettlement programme has failed with not a single project sustainable after 5 years. Argues the need for clear criteria for expropriation of commercial farmland and for farm workers to be a priority target in land reform projects.