This document is a collection of briefs that summarizes select papers presented at the 2005 workshop: “Land Rights for African Development: From Knowledge to Action” hosted by UNDPs Drylands Development Center and the International Land Coalition. The workshop addressed key land tenure issues in Africa that influence food security, environmental sustainability, agricultural intensification, conflict, peace building and broader rural development.

This brief summarizes findings of relevant IFPRI research on land management and governance to promote strategies and policies targeted toward the achievement of gender equity, poverty reduction, and sustainable resource management.

Towards a Common Platform on Access to Land has evolved through an extensive process of global consultation that was launched in 2000 at the eighth session of the United Nations Commission on Sustainable Development. It aims to stimulate and support public policies and country-level activities that improve access by the poor to land and productive requirements in order to improve their production and household incomes. Its global scope means that it can gather and disseminate knowledge and lessons learned from and to different countries and regions.

This paper was presented at the Regional Workshops on Land Policy Issues (2002) and complements three other regional studies to feed a research report on access to land and governance with respect to land supported by the World Bank and a number of donors  to review the characteristics, accessibility, costs and sustainability of different land titling and registration options in a range of countries. Specifically, this paper sets out key experience in Asia. 

Land is a central issue for both rural and urban communities in Sudan. It is not just a means of livelihood and basic survival, but also has profound cultural and socio-political dimensions. Local level conflict over access to natural resources, often in a context of environmental degradation, have always characterised the interaction of different groups in Sudan. However, issues of governance and administration, both at the local and national levels, have precipitated these conflicts and magnified their impact to a national scale.

Territorial Development: an innovative approach

If 2009 was the end of the hinterland and the beginning of a new globalized forest era, 2010 was a year of pushback. Worldwide, the news was full of reports of forest communities and Indigenous Peoples pushing back at land grabs and shaping policy at the national and global levels, and of governments countering and trying to contain community rights. Some governments and private investors accepted or even embraced the new players at the table and began to promote fairer business and conservation models.

The VG exercise has been presented as a continuum from the ICARRD Conference and commitments by Member States; therefore there is scope for a comparative analysis of the two texts.

The following lesson brief examines the land issues confronting returnees as well as the IDPs who remain in the camps in Uganda. In 2005, between 2.1 million and 2.4 million people were displaced by conflicts in northern Uganda.

This lesson brief explores the struggles women face in benefiting from their customary rights. It is part of the Uganda module on the Focus on Africa: Land Tenure and Property Rights online educational tool.

This lesson brief focuses on four issues - compulsory acquisition uses; procedures for exercising this authority; compensation; and redress - which are central to balancing private land rights and compulsory land acquisition for public purposes.It is part of the Uganda module on the 

This lesson brief examines the law and practice of allocating land in the protected estate for private investment. It is part of the Uganda module on the Focus on Africa: Land Tenure and Property Rights online educational tool. Private investors need land to conduct their business.