INTRODUCTION:
"Over the years, the Human Rights Foundation of Monland (HURFOM) has produced a number of accounts highlighting the hardship faced by Mon people who have become victims to land confiscation. In this report, HURFOM reports on the effects from the recent surge of Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) coming into Burma.

Today’s food and financial crises have, in tandem, triggered a new global land grab. On the one hand, “food insecure” governments that rely on imports to feed their people are snatching up vast areas of farmland abroad for their own offshore food production. On the other hand, food corporations and private investors, hungry for profits in the midst of the deepening financial crisis, see investment in foreign farmland as an important new source of revenue. As a result, fertile agricultural land is becoming increasingly privatised and concentrated.

This Situation Update describes events occurring in Kyainseikgyi, Kawkareik, and Win Yay townships, Dooplaya District between December 2013 and February 2014, including land confiscation, villagers’ livelihoods, abuses, explicit threats and updates on villagers’ education and healthcare

GRAIN is a small international non-profit organisation that works to support small farmers and social movements in their struggles for community-controlled and biodiversity-based food systems. Our support takes the form of independent research and analysis, networking at local, regional and international levels, and fostering new forms of cooperation and alliance-building. Most of our work is oriented towards, and carried out in, Africa, Asia and Latin America.

A global coalition of 14 Partners and over 120 international, regional and community organizations advancing forest tenure, policy, and market reforms.....

Core Beliefs:

"Based on our experience, we find that empowerment of rural people and asset-based development are part of a process that is dependent on a set of enabling conditions, including security of tenure to access and use natural resources. As a coalition of diverse and varied organizations, RRI is guided by a set of core beliefs...

Rights of Poor Communities Must Be Recognized and Strengthened:

The current reforms in Burma/Myanmar are worsening land grabs in the country. Since the mid-2000s there has been a spike in land grabs, especially leading up to the 2010 national elections. Military and government authorities have been granting large-scale land concessions to well-connected Burmese companies.

Commentary: Land Confiscation;
Situation of land confiscation in Nam-Zarng and Kun-Hing;
Land confiscated, villagers house destroyed, in Nam-Zarng;
Cultivated land confiscated in Nam-Zarng;
Farmlands and cemetery ground confiscated in Nam-Zarng;
Lands confiscated, forced labour used, to build new military bases and an airstrip, in Kun-Hing;
Confiscation of land with regard to mining projects;
Land Confiscation due to coal mining concession in Murng-Sart;

Commentary: Why people still flee Shan State and seek refuge in other countries...
Contents: Themes & Places of Violations reported in this issue...
MAP...
Situation of people fleeing their native places in Kae-See...
Land confiscation and mining project causing people to flee, in Murng-Su...
Military operation, forced labour and extortion, causing people to flee, in Murng-Kerng...
Continuing forced labour, forced recuruitment and extortion causing people to flee, in Lai-Kha...
Forced recruitment causing people to flee, in Kung-Hing

What rural dwellers in the Global South experience as land grabbing, tends to be seen in the Global North as ‘agricultural investment’. The World Bank has been at the forefront of a drive to legitimate these investments, convening to win support for a code of conduct based on Responsible Agricultural Investment (RAI) principles. Many key civil society groups reject the proposal for a code of conduct, objecting to the top-down process by which it was formulated and arguing that it was more likely to legitimate than prevent land grabbing.

Farmers from Ayeyarwady Region have established an association to strengthen their land use rights and improve technical knowledge.

The Farmer Development Association is based on more than 50 village-level groups, ranging in size from five to more than 30 members, formed recently in Bogale, Kyaiklat and Mawlamyinegyun townships...

Since a new quasi-parliamentary government led by former army officers began work in Burma (Myanmar) earlier this year, some observers have argued that the government is showing a commitment to bring about, albeit cautiously, reforms that will result in an overall improvement in human rights conditions.

A video recording of a whole-day conference held on 18 June 2015. The page begins with text presentations. For the video recordings of the event, scroll down to Webcasts....."Co-Organized by RRI and IUCN, in partnership with the Embassy of France in Washington, DC...