While the need for land-related investment for sustainable land management and increased productivity is well recognized, quantitative evidence on agricultural productivity effects of secure property rights in Africa is scant. Within-household analysis of investments by owner-cum-occupants in Uganda points toward significant and quantitatively large investment effects of full ownership. Registration is estimated to have no investment effects, whereas measures to strengthen occupancy rights attenuate investment disincentives.

Since the early 1980s, China has initiated a series of property rights reforms in the collectively owned forest area to motivate farmers in forest management. Assessment of farmers' behaviors in response to the reforms would be useful when policy adjustments are considered. This paper investigated farmers' participation and investment using labor and money input in forest management as indicators. The data were collected in Tonggu County in southern China.

SUMMARYThe mixed outcomes of seemingly well-intentioned partnerships that try to create mutually beneficial agreements between local communities and private firms remain a puzzle. This study looks for answers to this puzzle by reviewing a large number of empirical studies in a wide variety of contexts.

The use and exploitation of natural resources is generally structured by institutions, especially by property institutions. The main objective of this paper is to present a diachronic analysis of the institutionalization of common land property in Portugal. The several types of ownership may be largely explained by common land history. We intend to draw an outline of the emergence, evolution and transition of common land from the late nineteenth century to the present day, using the matrix proposed by Heller.

Digital 3D cadastres are often envisaged as the visualisation of 3D property rights (legal objects) and to some extent, their physical counterparts (physical objects) such as buildings and utility networks on, above and under the surface. They facilitate registration and management of 3D properties and reduction of boundary disputes. They also enable a wide variety of applications that in turn identify detailed and integrated 3D legal and physical objects for property management and city space management (3D land use management).

Within Australia’s tropical savanna zone, the northernmost frontier regions have experienced the swiftest transition towards multifunctional occupance, as a formerly flimsy productivist mode is readily displaced by more complex modes, with greater prominence given to consumption, protection and Indigenous values. Of these frontier regions, Cape York Peninsula has become the focus for increasingly entrenched, complex contests about regional futures, with the transition towards complex multifunctionality demonstrated in the 1970, 1990 and 2010 tenure maps.

Property lies at the heart of the urban development process. While it creates the wealth needed to finance the urban economy, property can also be a source of disenfranchisement, especially among those unable to cope with the rules set by the market and facilitated by government policy. The hegemony of individual property particularly presents a paradox.

This paper presents an analysis of agricultural contracts using a transaction costs approach. We contend that in a context of modern agriculture, with well defined property rights, agricultural contracts must balance costs and benefits, aligning tenant and landlord incentives towards a similar objective. The study debates the potential effects of tenancy status and duration of contracts, over soil conservation and input use.

Ecosystem services can bridge biodiversity conservation and development needs, but there is little information available on how conservation organizations implement such projects. We documented 103 ecosystem service projects – from 37 countries – implemented by The Nature Conservancy (TNC) and the World Wildlife Fund (WWF).

Multifunctional land use has become a widely supported pathway for Europe's countryside. Brussels and the national governments stimulate farmers to integrate primary production with non-agricultural practices from which they can also benefit. In favour of this development different stakeholders are encouraged to collaborate to produce the so-called farmer-managed public goods. This paper explores critical success factors for the production and maintenance of these public goods.

This paper revisits the water deeds approach first proposed by Vernon Smith to construct an agent level dynamic optimization model using a simple discrete time framework. First a model of groundwater exploitation for a depletable aquifer is examined. Next an agent level model is solved allowing the agent to trade in the stock of water available at any point in time.

According to property rights theory, national plant genetic resources (PGRs) are sovereign properties rather than resources belonging to the common heritage of humankind. Consequently, provider states can claim compensation from users of their national PGRs, leading to the need for bilateral or multilateral agreements to share national PGRs' commercial benefits. However, as benefit-sharing agreements are made exante, estimating the potential profit is difficult. Thus, issues around asymmetric information about the commercial value of such resources have emerged.