Poverty and malnutrition are significant problems in South Africa. The vast majority of poor people in the country are black and live in rural areas (RDP 1995; SALDRU 1994). Unemployment in South Africa is extremely high, female-headed households and black children are particularly vulnerable, and basic services are inadequate.' The poorest segments of South African society are overwhelmingly dependent upon a mix of social pensions, remittances, low wages, piece jobs, and, to a small extent, agricultural production. The nutritional situation in South Africa is as alarming.

It is widely believed that land tenure insecurity under a customary tenure system leads to socially inefficient resource allocation. This article demonstrates that land tenure insecurity promotes tree planting, which is inefficient from the private point of view but could be relatively efficient from the viewpoint of the global environment. Regression analysis, based on primary data collected in Sumatra, indicates that tenure insecurity in fact leads to early tree planting.

Developing countries have to allocate limited government resources for rural areas among different investment activities and regions to achieve the twin goals of productivity growth and poverty alleviation. This is particularly important at a time when many countries are facing severe financial constraints. This paper develops a framework and provides empirical evidence on the impact of government investments in technology, irrigation, education and infrastructure on agricultural productivity growth and rural poverty reduction in rural India.

Brief paper on the role of property rights in the economic analysis of environmental problems in Southeast Asia. First talks about the causal role of property rights in the existence of environmental problems, then how property rights must be incorporated into the economic analyses of these problems. Finally, addresses the extent to which changes in property regimes may offer scope for solving persistent environmental problems.

The relationship between land ownership and the sustainable use of natural resources is examined within the context of constitutional change in Africa. Using Kenya as an example, it is demonstrated that current constitutional arrangements put excessive emphasis on the protection of private property rights without requiring the corresponding duty of ecological stewardship. This has resulted in the failure of government policies and development practices to fully integrate environmental considerations into growth strategies.

El presente Decreto reglamenta parcialmente el capítulo XIII de la Ley Nº 160 de 1994, en lo relativo a las zonas de reserva campesina, las cuales se constituirán y delimitarán por la Junta Directiva del Instituto Colombiano de la Reforma Agraria (INCORA), en zonas de colonización, en las regiones en donde predomine la existencia de tierras baldías y en las áreas geográficas cuyas características agroecológicas y socioeconómicas requieran la regulación, limitación y ordenamiento de la propiedad o tenencia de predios rurales.

Ukraine shall be a sovereign and independent, democratic, social, law-based state (Article 1). The sovereignty of Ukraine shall extend throughout its entire territory. Ukraine shall be a unitary state. The territory of Ukraine within its present borders shall be indivisible and inviolable (Article 2). Everyone shall have the right to an environment that is safe for life and health, and to compensation for damages caused by violation of this right.

This Law amends Environmental Planning Law No. 52/91. It consists of 7 articles establishing the competent authorities entitled to issue a financial assistance to rural lands included.

In Pakistan, where agriculture is heavily dependent on irrigation, informal water markets are an increasingly important way to provide small farmers and tenant farmers with access to ground- water. The public canal irrigation system provides water to farmers who own land within designated areas, but it does not provide all farmers with adequate water supplies when they need it. Therefore, farmers who can afford it are installing tubewells as a sole or supplementary source of irrigation (Figure 1).

This paper uses income decomposition techniques to demonstrate the importance of livestock income in improving rural income distribution. It is based on three-year household panel data (1986 to 1989) from rural Pakistan. The paper first decomposes total income among five sources: agricultural, nonfarm, livestock, rental and transfer. This shows that livestock income is inequality-decreasing and that it makes the smallest contribution to overall inequality. The study then decomposes the sources of livestock inequality by type of animal.

This paper introduces a modeling method which simulates a village's response to population and market pressure. The method combines a linear programming model with a biophysical model of soil condition and plant growth. The linear programming model simulates farmers' plans aggregated at the village level, and the biophysical model predicts yields and land degradation for different land use and cropping patterns. The method has been calibrated for two villages located in a semi-arid and a sub-humid savanna region in Burkina Faso in West Africa.

Using a mathematical-programming agricultural-sector model of Egypt, this paper analyzes mechanisms for allocating scarce water and for charging the farmers the Operation and Management (O&M) costs of irrigation and drainage, currently covered by the government. The effects of cost recovery are negative but minor. A crop charge (based on crop water consumption per land unit) and a volumetric charge both discourage consumption. The former is easier to implement but does not stimulate water-saving technical change.