News on Land

One of Australia’s most powerful Indigenous organisations has abruptly fired its chief executive, and members are asking questions

The federal government has been asked to launch a full investigation into one of the country’s most powerful Aboriginal organisations, the Northern Land Council (NLC), as bitter tensions continue after the abrupt sacking of its CEO last month.

• 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.

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.

• Indigenous leaders in Ecuador say that a lack of progress toward addressing key issues stands in the way of their fundamental territorial rights.
• Concerns include resource extraction projects initiated without proper prior consent and consultation, as well as the activation of several mining and oil concessions in Ecuador.
• The outcry comes at a time when indigenous peoples are increasingly being recognized as key partners in ensuring the protection of the world’s tropical forests.

Brazilian councilwoman assassinated in Rio de Janeiro in March was killed by a militia looking to protect its interests controlling land in unregulated slums, Brazilian official says.

Marielle Franco, the Brazilian councilwoman assassinated in Rio de Janeiro in March was killed by a militia looking to protect its interests controlling land in unregulated slums, a Brazilian official has said.

The land permit process may exclude indigenous communities from untitled land they have been farming, experts warn

BANGKOK - Millions of people risk being forced off their land in Myanmar due to a recently-amended law, which campaigners and analysts warned could also undermine peace negotiations between the government and ethnic armed groups.

SOMSAK SAE-LAO, an assistant village chief in the small Nan community of Pang Kob, still has no idea whether his villagers could be subject to any benefits for helping protect surrounding forest under a global scheme known as REDD+, if implemented here.

The village has unresolved overlapping claims with Khun Nan National Park on a high mountain, thus becoming uncertain about their land rights.

Uganda’s land is demarcated into Mailo, Freehold, Leasehold and Customary occupancy, which some consider an irrational land system. Over the years, this tenure has gone through a metamorphosis of traditional, colonial and post-independence vicissitudes; the latter of the three periods, has been tumultuous.

President Joko "Jokowi" Widodo handed over about 6,000 land certificates to residents during his working visit to Pekanbaru, Riau, on Saturday, as part of efforts to fulfill his administration's ambitious agrarian reform program. 

Of the total certificates, 3,000 were part of the land certification program, while the remaining half were certificates of land redistribution under the mechanism of land objects for agrarian reform (TORA). 

As part of Women's Month and the centenary of Mama Albertina Sisulu, the Department of Social Development will today launch a women empowerment project at Mawewe Tribal Authority in Mgobodi village, Mpumalanga.

The project aims to empower and secure the livelihoods and rights of women living in rural areas, in the context of sustainable development goals and the current national discourse on women's rights to equitable access to productive land in South Africa.

Joan Carling is an indigenous rights activist and environmental defender from the Philippines. She has been defending land rights from grassroots to international levels for more than 20 years. Her main concerns include protection of land rights of indigenous peoples, ensuring sustainable development of natural resources and upholding human rights of marginalized people. She has actively participated in global processes to defend these concerns, including those related to the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change and REDD+.