A CLASSIC RESPONSE from governments and businesses in recent time is not just to characterize legitimate grievances by Indigenous Peoples and local communities as anti- government, anti-development, and anti-investment. They are waging wars against Indigenous Peoples and individuals who are protecting the planet and its people by criminalizing their legitimate grievances and then threatening, arresting, intimidating, and imprisoning those who dare challenge this mode of development. 

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“It is up to me to follow in the same footsteps as my father walked, so that they’ll give us back our land again.” 

- Ramón Bedoya, Colombia

“The desire for justice and reparations for the fallen defenders, for their families, and above all that this never happens again—that is an energy that compels you to keep working.”

– Isela González, Mexico

In June 2018, SciTech Europa travelled to Brussels, Belgium, to attend the 2018 instalment of European Development Days (EDD) as the event’s media partner. Organised by the European Commission, EDD brings the development community together each year to share ideas and experiences in ways that inspire new partnerships and innovative solutions to the world’s most pressing challenges.

In the fading afternoon light, Kou Berpa leads a small group out to a patch of land a short distance off of the main road in Ganta, Liberia.

The land is strewn with rocks and dried vegetation. The jagged remains of a tree stump consume one corner. It’s easy to miss the green shoots scattered across the grounds – the beginnings of a crop of corn that Kou has planted.

The Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) represent unprecedented and increasing global recognition of land rights—especially women’s land rights. Leaders across the globe have included three land-specific sex-disaggregated indicators:

• Under Goal 1 (No Poverty), indicator 1.4.2 measures legally recognized documentation of rights to land and perceptions of secure tenure;

The failure to secure the property rights of rural communities shows a clear policy gap between citizens and rights to land as per the Constitution and the attitude and practices of the state, traditional leaders, white farmers and mining companies in relation to such rights. 

Absent from the discourse spurred by the motion passed in the National Assembly on 27 February is what could be achieved in the interim for land reform programme using existing legislation while the country awaits a verdict on the constitutional amendment to determine whether is possible to expropriate land w

The back has been broken on legal denial of community property. This is the conclusion of a study of land laws in 100 countries.

Factually, most administrations now acknowledge community lands as a viable unit of property and provide mechanisms through which this essentially social form may be formally mapped and registered. And I mean community property, with comparable legal protections as granted private and corporate property.

Sophorn Poch, Director of the Independent Mediation Organization (IMG), gives us some insights into his involvement with the Second Regional Land Forum as well as his hopes in terms of the Forum's outcomes.  

After years of efforts, land rights are finally getting global attention. With several land-related indicators included in the Sustainable Development Goals, the land sector now has the unique opportunity to create an unprecedented momentum around land tenure issues and bring it to a higher level on the development agenda. Our goal is, of course, to contribute to the success of the SDGs, but also to be part of sustainable development in its real and practical sense!

Much of the world’s rural landscapes are technically managed by national governments with limited recognition of, or support for, the rights and management responsibilities of the rural poor who live in these areas. In an era of large-scale land acquisitions for global commodity production, this has led, in some cases, to governments allocating vast tracts of land and resources to companies with limited or no consultation of the people affected.

As part of the Feed the Future initiative, USAID is helping the Government of Tanzania to improve communities’ understanding of land rights, support village land use planning, and clarify, document and certify property rights.

For hundreds of years, pastoralists in Ethiopia’s lowlands have relied on strong customary land tenure systems to survive. Historically, legislation has failed to clearly define communal rights to rangelands, and the specific roles and responsibilities for both communities and local government to administer and manage these resources. This legislative deficiency prevented pastoral communities from fully exercising their constitutional rights to land (Ethiopia’s Constitution broadly recognizes pastoral communities’ right to access land and prevents their involuntary displacement).