Millions of peasant farmers in the rural areas of Sierra Leone do not own land of their own but have to rent from land owning families. Added to their poverty is the fact that they depend on Shylock money lenders to secure seeds and capital for their farming activities.

At the end of the day, their harvests are not only meagre but most it goes to paying debt and interest that are trapping them in a vicious circle of poverty, which when looked at closely are responsible for the majority of youths abandoning the countryside for life in the city.

The documents form part of a nationwide programme to secure property rights for home owners in informal settlements

DAR ES SALAAM, Feb 6 (Thomson Reuters Foundation) - For Maria Mkwawa, the Tanzanian government's decision to issue her with a formal land title to her home in January was a pleasant surprise.

"It will help me in many ways," she told the Thomson Reuters Foundation.

"My family has a bright future."

We are very pleased to invite proposals for sessions for the LANDac Annual International Conference 2019. Practitioners, researchers, policymakers, all are welcome to organise a session at this year’s conference. We welcome workshops, panels, roundtables, debates, talk shows and other innovative formats. Films and exhibitions are also very welcome, as well as posters about your organisation or project.

After a controversial land-reform program transferred many commercial farms from white to black ownership, some of the new farmers have struggled to prove that they own the land. But since the government has replaced title deeds with 99-year leases, uncertainty remains about what “ownership” really means.

BINDURA, ZIMBABWE — On the outskirts of town, Blazio Dengu grows maize, soybeans and wheat on more than 60 hectares (148 acres) of land.

Dengu expects high yields this year, but he worries that he might not be able to profit from them.

A United Nations commission has released a trio of letters it recently delivered to Canada that warn the country is likely failing to meet its commitments to the rights of Indigenous peoples.

Two of the letters concern infrastructure projects underway in British Columbia.

• We do not need to search too far to find a roadmap for a global New Deal for Nature and People.
• By not viewing environmental issues as human rights issues, gross human rights abuses can occur while weakening humanity’s ability to combat climate change.
• If the global community is to make progress on linking the health of nature with the health of people and the collective future of humankind, then environmental issues like climate change must be framed within the Universal Declaration of Human Rights.

For millions of people worldwide, land is a fundamental asset and source of wealth, security, social status, and economic opportunity. Secure land rights provide the foundation to improve lives and create pathways out of poverty – for women, families, and whole communities. Landesa’s work securing land rights for rural people has taken us around the world.

We invite you to explore our 2018 Annual Report to learn where this journey has taken us over the past year. To our many supporters, partners, and friends who make our work possible, we offer our deepest thanks.

The Land Portal Foundation is pleased to announce financial support by the Deutsche Gesellschaft für Internationale Zusammenarbeit (GIZ) to scale up work on information management and dissemination.

In particular, GIZ support will go towards expanding existing and creating new thematic portfolios on the Land Portal.

Result of Service

Indigenous communities across Malaysia face relentless harassment, intimidation, arrest, violence and even death as they peacefully resist attempts to force them off land they consider ancestral, a report by Amnesty International reveals today.

The Government of Liberia (GoL) in collaboration with the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO), and development partners have expressed commitment to implementing two major land tenure regulations, which include the Voluntary Guidelines on the Responsible Governance (VGGT) on the Tenure of Land, Fisheries and Forest and the Land Rights Act (LRA) process.

The government and partners have henceforth, instituted the land tenure regulations to enhance food security, and to ensure land access for many of the citizens.

A global coalition of grassroots groups of small food producers and food sovereignty advocates has called on a United Nations expert to probe allegations of state-perpetrated land grabs in Cambodia ahead of an upcoming review of the human rights situation in the country.