Over the last month the news all over the world broke with stories about the departure of US forces from Afghanistan and its takeover by the Taliban. Many wonder what the future will bring to those who remained and to those who fled the country. This thought immediately raises all sorts of questions which include 'what will happen to access, control, and ownership of land in states of transition?'

Over time, land registration has been associated with a diversity of desired outcomes, ranging from modernization and the promotion of sustainable agricultural production to protection of the livelihoods of small-scale producers notably women, peacebuilding or even nurturing good practices of local governance. In this session we have discussed, for a range of settings: How confident are we about the results of registration and formalization program? How have they been justified and have the ambitions been reached?

“Tenure and its governance are crucial factors in the fight against inequality and discrimination, for sustainable use of the environment, social stability and resilience toward the overall achievement of the SDGs.”  FAO, Why Land Rights Matter, 2020

The pandemic has shown the Colombian government how structural land issues continue to hamper rural development.

Colombia’s hospitals have been challenged due to Covid-19, and while the government rushes to strengthen the country’s healthcare system, intensive care unit occupancy remains high throughout the pandemic.

When a woman has legal access to and control over land and its profits, she improves her own life and that of her family.  In order for this to happen, equitable laws, policies, systems and customs that promote and support women’s land ownership must be put into effect.

The data revolution – characterised by the transition to big data, open data and new digital data infrastructures [1] – is projected to make an astonishing 44 billion terabytes of digital data and information available by the end of 2020 [2]. Despite this plethora of information now available to us, about 1 billion people in 140 countries still feel insecure about their land and property rights [3].

A USAID brief, published to mark 16 Days of Activism against Gender-Based Violence, reveals important lessons from land rights registration activities in Zambia

Securing women’s land rights is an important global development goal and has been linked to significant gains in women’s economic empowerment and community development. At the same time, the process of documenting these rights can create resentment and increase conflict not only between spouses, but also within families and communities, often leading to gender-based violence.

This is the story of how dozens of communities in Mozambique are mapping and documenting their own land rights. "A New Hope" is the winner of the Land Portal's Second Data Story Contest, and is authored by the team at Terra Firma Mozambique.  

The National Council of Applied Economic Research (NCAER) recently released India’s first Land Records and Services Index.

Matito Leruso was born and raised in the herding community of Lengurma in Isiolo County. Communal grazing land has been central to her community’s livelihood, wellbeing, and identity for generations, but they have never had their legal rights to govern it recognized. None of Kenya’s thousands of pastoralist communities have. This changed in 2016, with the passage of the Community Land Act. Since then, Matito has joined other residents of Lengurma in working to understand, use and shape the new law to ensure that their community land rights are respected and upheld.

Next week the Conference on Land Policy in Africa (CLPA) - Winning the Fight against Corruption in the Land Sector: Sustainable Pathway for Africa’s Transformation, will take place in Abidjan. The African Union recognises that corruption is a key factor hampering efforts at promoting governance, socio-economic transformation, peace and security, and the enjoyment of human rights in the Member States.