Progress Towards the SDG Land Rights Commitments

In 2015 we celebrated world leaders’ recognition of the foundational and strategic role that secure land rights for all –women and men, regardless of ethnicity, religion, place of residence, or civil, economic, social, or political status—must play to achieve a world free of poverty, hunger and systemic gender discrimination.

Five years after the SDGs were set in motion and a third of the way into their implementation timeframe, it is important to assess how far we have come: what have countries done to address their ambitious but critical cross-cutting commitments to ensure secure land rights for all, particularly for the poor, the vulnerable and the small producers, and to eradicate gender differences in these rights? This assessment is particularly timely given that the 2020 High Level Political Forum reviewed progress toward SDGs 1, 2, 5 and 15 all dealing directly with land and land rights.