News on Land

Namibia will launch the baseline study that was conducted in 2016 by the University of Namibia which was aimed at investigating the status of women’s land use, ownership and rights under customary land tenure system, at an event on Thursday in Ongwediva, northern Namibia.

The study was prepared for the Konrad Adenauer Stiftung (KAS), a German political foundation, through the special initiative, ‘One World- No Hunger: strengthening Women’s land use and land ownership in Sub-Sahara Africa’.

Accra, Aug 2, GNA – A two-day workshop has ended in Accra with a call on Queen Mothers to serve as champions in women’s quest to access and control land in their communities.

The workshop, organised by the Ghana Integrity Initiative (GII), the National chapter of Transparency was to forge a partnership between civil society and Queen Mothers in promoting women land rights and seek to find solutions and promote gender equity, thus forging closer ties between the citizens and traditional authorities.

• Asian regional members of the International Land Coalition (ILC) called for greater recognition of the rights of indigenous peoples to control their land and resources and their own development.
• PROFOR published a study analyzing forest tenure regimes in Argentina, Colombia, El Salvador, Honduras, Nicaragua and Peru.
• During a regional inception workshop convened by the LPI and IFPRI, 12 African countries embarked on the pilot ‘Monitoring and Evaluation of Land in Africa’ (MELA) project.

The President of Ghana Institutions of Surveyors (GhIS), Mr. Edwin Addo-Tawiah has said, it is time surveyors take strategic decisions for the development of the country, considering the United Nations Development Goal (UNDG) which has been estimated that, 60% of Africans would be living in the urban areas by 2020.

According to him, there is therefore, the need for land professionals to equip themselves in terms of decision making in developmental projects.

The government this week reaffirmed its commitment to indigenous peoples living in Cambodia, promising to protect their traditional ways of life ahead of International Day of the World’s Indigenous Peoples.

Prime Minister Hun Sen issued an open letter on Tuesday ahead of the international day that is set for August 9 and which the government plans to observe.

Monrovia - The Civil Society Working Group on Land Rights Reforms has expressed its dismay over the exclusion of CSOs and Liberians from the legislative consultative forum over the Land Rights Act between the Liberian Land Authority (LLA), lawmakers and other stakeholders.

A new report highlights the crisis facing unprotected, internally displaced populations.

ith tragic photos of bodies on beaches surfacing in the news, the refugee crisis seems to be concentrated at the borders of Europe and the United States. But the desperate exiles who have fled to the West actually represent a minority who have managed to make it across borders. Most of the world’s refugees are not even officially labeled as such by international standards.

Land Portal Foundation launches country portfolio in effort to showcase local voices 

Land has played a critical role in Tanzania’s development as a nation. Current land tenure frameworks, issues and conflicts in the country have historical roots dating back to the pre-colonial period.

Hoedspruit - It was a hard-fought victory for South Africa's black community seeking to reclaim land, and for the Moletele ethnic group it has become a surprising model of wider racial cooperation.

After a 10-year legal battle, the Moletele have taken back the land from which they were evicted by members of the white minority nearly a century ago.

The area, a picturesque range at the foot of mountains near Hoedspruit is dotted with trees heavy with fruit.

Dignity restored

Aboriginal rights campaigners yesterday condemned the government for having not carried out a promise to reinstate traditional Aboriginal territories, and they demanded that an independent agency be established to restore Aboriginal rights to land and transitional justice.

President Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文) on Aug. 1 last year delivered a landmark apology to Taiwan’s Aborigines for their deprivation of rights in the hundreds of years since the mass migration of Han people began.