Recent increases in the prices of
agricultural commodities have spurred a surge of private
investment into farming and agribusiness. Given the right
types of large-scale investment, this can have a
transformative effect in underdeveloped rural areas and have
a positive effect on national economic development including
the provision of domestic food supply to urban areas that
can reduce dependence on food imports. This study analyzes

Urgent action required to challenge impunity of perpetrators, protect citizens and address root causes of environmental crisis

Most analyses of violence in Darfur ignore the local dimension of the crisis, focusing instead on the region’s economic and political marginalization and climatic variability. However, agricultural change and other changes relating to the land-rights and land-use systems have led to competition and exclusion, and have played a major role in the collective violence that has raged throughout the region. Understanding these questions is essential for the successful resolution of political and policy debates in Darfur.

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Bolivia benefited from an overall
favorable economic evolution in the last few years,
supported by sound macro-economic indicators. Yet, economic
growth was unevenly distributed between the sectors, with
particularly extractive industries, construction and
financial services showing higher real growth rates, while
agriculture and manufacturing fell behind. This is an area
of concern for the government which-as manifested in the new

"For millions of people living in the world’s poorest countries, access to land is a matter not of wealth, but of survival, identity and belonging. Most of the 1.4 billion people earning less than US$1.25 a day live in rural areas and depend largely on agriculture for their livelihoods, while an estimated 2.5 billion people are involved in full- or part-time smallholder agriculture.

Food First Backgrounder, Spring 2014, Vol. 20, No. 1

Introduction: Land, Race and the Agrarian Crisis

The disastrous effects of widespread land grabbing and land concentration sweeping the globe do not affect all farmers equally. The degree of vulnerability to these threats is highest for smallholders, women and people of color—the ones who grow, harvest, process and prepare most of the world’s food.

This briefing paper makes the case for proactive business engagement in respecting land rights and ensuring legal, fair and inclusive practices on land use, access to natural resources and equitable development opportunities. It outlines key challenges, provides an overview of existing instruments that can help companies address issues related to land, and points to practical entry points for improved business practices.

La Reforma Agraria de la década de 1980 en Nicaragua dejó unas 50,000 beneficiarios sin una adecuada regularización de la tenencia de su tierra. El Programa de Servicios Legales Rurales (PSL) de Nitlapan Uca estableció una red nacional de oicinas atedida por abogados especialistas en regularización, asistencia técnica y capacitación a productores y producturas para formalizar su propiedad.

 

The practice of food security assessment in Tanzania is based on use of food crops production data surveys of a preceding seasonal year with agro-meteorological analyses based on estimated vegetation status as reflected from NDVI computed from NOAA satellite images.  Food security assessment essentially is a prediction of food availability in predefined future time framework. It helps to establish availability or deficiency of food, thereby facilitating planning and implementation of strategies to mitigate the problem of hunger.

Forest is an important natural resource to the Latvian economy. It is useful to examine the historical context to estimate objectively the events that created the structure of forest property rights today. While 50.3% of all Latvian forests are state-owned and the remaining 49.7% are under different ownership, historically this structure has changed with the political situation and the authorities.

A ‘pink tide’ swept over Latin America following Hugo Chávez's 1998 election to the presidency in Venezuela, bringing to power multiple left or center-left governments. What possibilities for and obstacles to social change were presented by their having attained power through the ballot box? This question is explored through an examination of Venezuela's agrarian reform and the promotion of agroecology within it.

This chapter uses both classic and contemporary literature to trace how land policies, and particularly land reform, have gained, lost, and regained prominence in development strategies and debates since the Second World War. It introduces contemporary issues and debates on gender and generational issues in land policy and land grabbing involving sometimes spectacularly large corporate land deals, and concluding with reflections on new ideas of food and land sovereignty that drive today’s agrarian movements.