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Context and backgroundIn 2017 Mali developed a law recognizing the customary land rights of local populations called the "Loi sur le Foncier Agricole" (LFA, Farmland Land Law). This law was celebrated by rural populations, particularly farmers, who saw their family farms protected from state monopolization through incorporation into the private real estate domain of the state by means of registration. It was in this euphoria that the Land Law (LDF) was passed in 2020 by ordinance. No.21-056 of October 7, 2021.Goal and Objectives:The purpose of our study was to know the impact of this LDF on the achievements of the LFA. Is the new legislation in line with the logic of protecting traditional, customary agricultural land, the object of the LFA, or does it call into question the gains made?.Methodology:Through a comparative analysis of the LFA and its application texts that are still in place, the LDF and its application decrees, the former Land and Property Code (CDF) and its application texts, the texts on decentralization in Mali, the laws on administrative organization and the laws on the Domain services.Results:The results of our research have shown that the new law on domains and land tenure is an insidious but violent challenge to the LFA in that it integrates customary lands, which are the subject of the LFA, into the State's private real estate domain as they were before the LFA was adopted in 2017. In addition, it abolishes the precarious titles that were an opportunity for the poor to access land to live on (agriculture, rural concessions) and to find housing (urban and rural housing concessions) in favor of a single document, the land title. This law sounds the death knell of legal dualism in a Mali that is still predominantly agricultural, where custom governs the essential aspects of social relations.
