This report addresses the environmental and human rights situation faced by villagers and migrant workers in Shwegyin township of Nyaunglebin District, Pegu Division, Burma.

This paper provides an analysis of the effectiveness and equitability of West African judicial, legal and administrative institutions for:providing accessible dispute resolutionprotecting the security of the urban and rural poor to hold and use land.The authors compare legislation of customary and non-state regulatory institutions in Ghana, with the greater Pluralism of Côte d’Ivoire.

This paper presents an overview of key issues in the literature on gender justice in the sub-Saharan Africa region. Issues discussed include the exclusion of women from full citizenship status; gender inequalities in property relations, family relations and access to justice; and disregard for women's and men's sexual and reproductive health and rights.

A study of the San, the poorest and most marginalised minority group in Namibia, with little access to existing political and economic institutions. They have been dispossessed of most of their ancestral lands and on lands they still occupy there are major issues of resource overuse, degradation, illegal grazing, unclear legal status and ongoing threats of dispossession. Looks at threats to San lands in 4 distinct parts of the country and the legal issues raised by those threats.

The Katkari are classified as a Primitive Tribal Group with specific measures for legal protection of their rights, and there are provisions in the Integrated Tribal Development Project (ITDP) to compensate land owners in cases of expropriation of land. This paper provides a rationale, co-created by the villagers, to continue learning about their land rights, and to explore more actively the options for diversifying community livelihoods.

The paper analyzes a workshop to enhance Katkari claims to land, which the tribal people have inhabited for 45 years. Participants felt confident in the findings of the exercise and with their decision to proceed with a petition to village authorities. They also said that the assessment gave them a better sense of their relative power and legitimacy in relation to the issue. The conditions for making a petition for legal title to the hamlet improved during three months, due to shifts in the assessment of power and interests for a number of stakeholders.

Towards the end of this assessment process, participants decided to present a land petition at the village assembly and with officials of the revenue department, in an attempt to broaden their network of support and draw attention to their rights. The focus of the assessment was neglect of government officials and elected representatives. Participants also recognized that gaps in information and communication related to the Katkari’s legal rights as residents of tribal lands, worsen the situation by keeping from public view illegal advantages held by wealthy landowners.

This issue of Land Reform, Land Settlement and Cooperatives offers the reader a series of articles and information and examones the importance of land tenure data and databases and their roles in their host societies. The volume represents rich set of articles specific for many regions and countries. The data presented is crucial for decison and policy making inthe fields of economic development, food security and environmental sustainability,