The absence of a clearly defined land use policy in Kenya after years of independence has resulted in a haphazard approach to managing the different land use practices and policy responses. Land use continues to be addressed through many uncoordinated legal and policy frameworks that have done little to unravel the many issues that affect land use management. The Constitution of Kenya 2010, Kenya Vision 2030 and the Sessional Paper No. 3 of 2009 on National Land Policy all call for a clear framework for effectively addressing the challenges related to land use.

The acquisition of land by foreigners in developing countries has emerged as a key mechanism for foreign direct investment (FDI). FDI is defined by the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) as the category of international investment that reflects the objective of a resident entity in one economy to obtain a lasting interest in an enterprise resident in another economy.

The cadastral system2 in Kenya was established in 1903 to cater for land alienation for the white settlers. Since then, a hundred years later, the structure of the system has remained more or less the same despite major changes in surveying technology. The government of Kenya has realized that the current structure is not conducive to economic demands of the 21st century and is interested in re-organizing the structure in line with the current constitutional dispensation and new paradigms in land management.

In Kenya, insecure land tenure and inequitable access to land, forest and water resources have contributed to conflict and violence, which has in turn exacerbated food insecurity. To address these interlinked problems, a new set of laws and policies on food security and land governance are currently being introduced or designed by the Government of Kenya. The new Food Security Bill explicitly recognizes the link between food security and land access, and the 2012 land laws target the corrupt system of land administration that made much of Kenya’s land grabbing possible.

In Kenya, insecure land tenure and inequitable access to land and natural resources have contributed to conflict and violence, which has in return exacerbated food insecurity. Most farmers in Kenya have no legal title for the land on which they farm. Sources of tenure insecurity can be ethnic conflicts over land between neighbouring communities, particularly in the Northern provinces, expropriation by the state or local government and land grabbing by local elite or companies. Competition is as well growing over water, especially over groundwater, which is scarce in Kenya.

Because of changes in some underlying factors, land is increasingly becoming a source of conflicts in Africa. We estimate the determinants of land conflicts and their impacts on input application in Kenya by using a recent survey of 899 rural households. We find that widows are about 13 percent more likely to experience pending land conflicts when their parcels are registered under the names of their deceased husbands than when titles are registered under their names.

Este es un caso de acceso a la tierra a través de la gestión comunitaria de parte de familias sin techo. En la búsqueda por una vivienda digna se apuesta por la gestión comunitaria para acceder a tierra, pero con una perspectiva ecológica para optimizar el espacio, así como gestionar el acceso a servicios básicos y soberanía alimentaria.

Se trata de un caso de legitimación y legalización de la posesión de tierra, que permite a los comunarios acceder a mayor participación dentro de los recursos y programas productivos de su municipio. Ubicada en plena frontera Brasil-Bolivia, se disputa el control territorial con los intereses de empresas madereras y expone las peculiaridades de la extranjerización de la tierra.

Se trata del caso del Consejo Comunitario comunidad negra de Pilamo y Palenque, reconocido como territorio por ley, a partir de procesos de ocupación pacífica de ttierras, negociación de compra de las mismas por parte del Estado y la correspondiente adjudicación.

La subdivisión del espacio familiar y la no disponibilidad de un registro adecuado, generó disputas por la ocupación de la tierra. Las nuevas generaciones de la comunidad enfrentan la situación retomando niveles de decisión colectiva y promoviendo la acción comunal con el fin de actualizar los derechos de propiedad, a través de la construcción de pactos internos y la negociación voluntaria.

Este material incluye una breve referencia al marco jurídico que orienta la política de reforma agraria y distribución de tierras, una descripción de la política de tierras en los últimos años, el desempeño del organismo de aplicación de dicha política, el Instituto Nacional de Desarrollo Rural y de la Tierra (INDERT), un recuento de los mecanismos existentes para el acceso a la tierra por parte de…