Niger is a landlocked country with 80% of its land area covered by desert. Only one eighth of the country's land area can be used for agriculture and livestock. Secure access to fertile land is therefore of vital importance as the country’s population economically depends on it. This scarcity of agricultural land is magnified by the extremely high population pressure in Niger, which has the highest fertility rate in the world. Small family farms mainly have traditional land tenure and use rights, which they may formally obtain, but in reality, this is practically impossible due to the low capacity and insufficient skills of the structures in charge of land tenure.  In some parts of the country, customary norms and practices restrict youth and women’s access to land, only in exceedingly rare instances do they access quality land. If women or youth are allocated marginal land, there is often no guarantee of long-term use.

As women and youth are particularly affected by the lack of legal security, they generally invest less in soil fertility and production improvement measures. However, the project Promotion de la Politique Foncière Rurale (ProPFR) Niger, adopted in 2021, promotes the same rights for men and women as the law enshrines that all official documents relating to the legal protection of land rights can be acquired equally by women and men. However, customary laws are still predominant and for example restrict women who may be financially able to buy and rent land on the land market, but in practice are confined from such acquisitions.

In addition, since the turn of the century, large-scale private investment in pastureland has increased and has led to large-scale land losses. On a smaller scale, this situation has further been exacerbated by numerous cases of smaller land grabs by farmers. This trend of land concentration is a consequence of the increasing demand for and scarcity of agricultural land and the lack of boundary definitions and use agreements between farmers and herders. Land scarcity has become a permanent source of conflict between farmers on the one hand and herders on the other. Although most of the time farmer-herder conflicts could theoretically be resolved at the local level, they often escalate. This intensifying conflict situation promotes stigmatisation as well as social division and contributes to the general destabilisation in the country.

It is in this context that ProPFR Niger was initiated, funded by the German Federal Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development (BMZ), with interventions starting in January 2023. The project's objective is to improve the legal protection of access to land for certain population groups, notably women, young people and pastoralists in certain communes of Tillabéri, Tahoua and Agadez. In order to achieve this, the project is divided into three main fields of activity to:

• Improve the institutional framework and procedures for securing land use as well as land ownership rights for smallholder farmers and livestock households,
• Increase civil society participation in the implementation of national land policies and the revision of the land legislation,
• Ensure that private agricultural investors, state and local actors are aware of the main contents of the national rural land policy.

The project will end in May 2026 after 3 years and 5 months of intervention in the regions of Tillabéri, Tahoua and Agadez and aims to achieve:

• Secured land ownership titles for 52,500 smallholder households.
• Collective land use rights and resources in pastoral areas for 700 herder households via social agreements, delimitation decrees and local conventions.
• 80% of conflicts in project target communities are addressed and resolved.
• Private investors will respect the prescriptions of the national rural land law.

General

    Context With around 7.3 million inhabitants, Laos is relatively sparsely populated. The poverty rate in Laos continues to fall and is now around 18% according to the World Bank (2019). Over 70% of Laotians depend directly or indirectly on agriculture and forestry for their living. Almost half of all farming families rely on subsistence farming. To drive forward the country’s development, the Lao Government is investing in agriculture and forestry, mining, and hydropower. It frequently awards extensive concessions to investors from within Laos and from neighbouring countries, including Vietnam and China. Until now, the rural population has derived limited benefit from this practice. It has little if any involvement in socioeconomic planning and management, and it is rare for civil society organisations to represent the population’s interests. Local people are not familiar with the state structure that ensures their land rights and cannot afford the fees to secure a title to their land. Women are particularly vulnerable to discrimination when land ownership is formalised as a result of inadequate education and traditional role models. The same applies to poor households and ethnic minorities.   Activities in Laos The institutional framework and procedures for securing land use and land ownership rights are improved. This is achieved, amongst other activities, through the development of legally compliant procedures for customary and collective tenure recognition. Planning processes, such as participatory land use planning in forest areas, have been strengthened among the authorities by established information sharing mechanisms and the participation of the local population in land use and agricultural land planning. Government authorities are trained to administer and guide investment in land in accordance with established legislation and recognised principles on responsible agriculture and forestry investment. Private agricultural and forestry investors’ awareness is raised and capacities strengthened to comply with national legislation and recognised principles for responsible investments in land. Local communities impacted by investment projects in land are informed and empowered through Targeted Awareness Raising mechanisms on land rights, usage of existing grievance mechanisms, and rights to participatory consultation, among others. An example from the field Till now, a large part of the Laotian population does not have formalized land rights. The authorities estimate that to date, around 1.5 million land titles have been issued, out of 3 million overall land plots. The Ministry of Natural Resources and Environment is aiming to implement an efficient and comprehensive land registration process in Laos. The project focuses mainly on rural areas. Skilled local teams are surveying and registering individual and municipal areas of land. Data from systematic land registration is being fed into the national land registry system (Lao LandReg), which is embedded at ministerial level. The land registry system will then generate individual land titles automatically at decentralised level. Work is also under way to create the statutory framework for strengthening customary land tenure security in forest areas. Results The project already achieved the registration of over 23.000 private land parcels in three provinces (82% of those parcels are registered in the names of women or with conjugal ownership). Village land use and agriculture management plans were developed in 93 villages. Around 200 government partners (79 women) from different agencies at all levels and more than 20.000 villagers (49% women) in target districts have been trained in-depth on Targeted Awareness Raising (TAR) on land rights and rights on investment projects. Moreover, to date, more than 35 private investment projects adhere to the principles of international guidelines such as the Voluntary Guidelines on the Responsible Governance of Tenure (VGGT) and the Principles for Responsible Agricultural Investments (RAI), due to the support and guidance of the project.

General

    Context Ethiopia is chronically food insecure and suffers significant food deficits each year. To tackle this challenge, the Government of Ethiopia strives to increase agricultural production, access to markets and employment opportunities. Investments in commercial agriculture are considered one of the key elements in advancing economic development and supporting the country in achieving food security. In the past, Ethiopia promoted foreign and domestic investment in large-scale farming and identified about 3 million hectares for commercial agricultural purposes. To facilitate economic development, the benefits of such investments need to be shared with local communities. However, achievements in this field remain limited and only a fraction of the land allocated was developed. Traditional land rights of local communities in rural areas remain inadequately documented and large-scale land allocations have often disregarded the rights of legitimate landowners. The struggle over resources between traditional landowners and investors led to a range of disputes and conflicts. The expectations of creating economic development and food security through large-scale land allocations for agriculture have not been met. In addition, government capacities on regulating investments and investor-community conflict management are limited. Agencies at all levels lack knowledge, structures and equipment to steer and monitor commercial agricultural land investments sufficiently. As a result, the rural population, and particularly women and marginalized groups, face great land tenure insecurity. To alleviate poverty and ensure food security in Ethiopia, it is thus essential to promote secure land tenure and responsible agricultural investments. Activities in Ethiopia The country module operates in three fields of activity: Improving Framework Conditions and Procedures: National and regional authorities in three regions will be sensitized and trained on institutional framework conditions and procedures to enhance land tenure security for the rural population. Strengthening the Civil Society: The civil society will be supported to contribute to the socio-political debate on responsible land policy through educational campaigns, training measures and awareness raising. Cooperation with the Private Sector: Private sector actors will be advised and capacitated in exchange fora with communities and trainings on effective land management, to deliver on environmental and social commitments. An example from the field The country module Ethiopia of the Global Project Responsible Land Policy is a continuation of the project “Support to Responsible Agricultural Investment” (S2RAI) implemented on behalf of the BMZ and with financial support from the European Union from March 2016 until June 2019 and thus capitalizes on previous lessons learned and products developed. Some of the main achievements include a digital land investment management and monitoring system (CAMiS), the development of contract templates, monitoring guidelines as well as the Guidelines for Social and Environmental Practices of Responsible Commercial Agriculture in Ethiopia (SECoP). Additionally, S2RAI supported the decision to redefine ceilings for agricultural investments from 1 million ha to 1,000 ha for domestic and 3,000 ha for foreign investors. Through strengthening of the organizational development of land institutions, awareness raising and capacity building the social and ecological performance of investors is now monitored. Both, the monitoring system as well as the SECoP guidelines have been taken up into the national strategy for commercial agriculture by the Ethiopian government. Furthermore, almost 80% of lease agreements have been reviewed. As a result, agreements covering about 70,000 ha were ended. In addition, investor-community dialogue fora, implemented by a local NGO, led to amicable land dispute resolutions and joint planning for the future. The project harmonized its efforts with other development interventions, such as thematically relevant GIZ projects and other donor projects in the context of land tenure, land use planning, land allocation and certification.   Impact stories