This paper is part of a set of working papers that resulted from the Resilience Academy 2013-2014. The United Nations University Institute of Environment and Human Security (UNU-EHS) publishes these papers as part of its UNU-EHS Working Paper series.
It presents several multi-scale case studies from islands around the world to offer a historically informed review of the cultural, environmental, political and economic systems and influences on island resilience.

The series of studies discussed in this overview pull together updated information about large-scale land acquisitions in the region, with the aim of identifying trends, common threats, divergences and possible solutions. As well as summarising trends in investment, trade, crop development and land tenure arrangements, the studies focus on the land tenure and human rights challenges.

The injustices of the land issue in South Africa under apartheid are well documented. A programme of land reform since then has had varied success. The authors argue that there is a great deal of empirical evidence to show that the private sector and markets make major contributions to South Africa’s development in general and to land reform in particular. It is in this light that this report looks at the contribution made by the private sector to land reform, both through organised land reform initiatives and in the ordinary course of their business.

Introduction and background.

This paper presents the preliminary results of two hypothetical futures for Vietnam, a High Climate Impact and a High Economic Growth Scenario.

This booklet provides information to forestry and land-use audiences, principally in developing countries, who want to find out more about the Clean Development Mechanism (CDM) and how it affects their activities.

Modeling of crop supply frequently adopts separate treatment of area and yield variables. The advantage of this approach is that it conveniently imposes the property of land being a quasi-fixed factor, at least on the aggregate. Given an agricultural land frontier, total supply of land may be fixed in the short run. Various crop multi-market models either ignore this property, thus foregoing the advantage of the area x yield formulation, or impose the aggregate land constraint in an ad hoc fashion.

Carrying capacity (CC) is a term often talked about in relation to livestock in the communal areas (CAs). It is the source of much confusion. This discussion paper will hopefully clarify some of the issues and make the implications for the policy debate clearer. It is based on the preliminary findings of field work carried out in Zvisharane District during 1986 and 1987.

This document summarises the proceedings from a conference organised by International Institute for Environment and Development (IIED) , Natural Resource insitute (NRI) and the Royal African Society in November 2004.The conference brought together a wide range of interest groups including, African policy makers, academics and civil society representatives, as well as representatives of the private sector and international agencies, to debate the way ahead for land rights and land reforms in Africa.

The advance of the agricultural frontier constitutes the biggest source of deforestation in Central America today. This conversion of tropical forests into agricultural land and pasture is the direct result of individual land use decisions. This paper presents a simple analytical model of household land use, followed by an econometric analysis of household survey data from the Río San Juan region of Nicaragua in order to test for consistency with the model.

This brief explores the reform of land tenure institutions which re-emerged in the 1990s, and asks if these reforms are any more gender sensitive than those of the past?The paper highlights that a focus of the recent reforms has been on land titling, designed to promote security of tenure and stimulate land markets. The reforms have often been driven by domestic and external neoliberal coalitions, with funding from global and regional organisations which have argued that private property rights are essential for a dynamic agricultural sector.

There is a common view and belief that women are the ones that do the farming in Africa while the men do not work much. This paper seeks to find explanations to why land productivity is lower on land rented out by female landlord households than on land rented out by male landlord households in the Ethiopian highlands. The authors find that female landlords have tenants who are older, own less oxen, are more related, and under longer-term contracts.