Unregistered ancestral lands and those under shifting cultivation will be protected under draft policy and protected from confiscation under under a draft land use policy, a change land rights groups say would be a major step forward for tenure security.

The phrase “land grab” has become common in Myanmar, often making front page news. This reflects the more open political space available to talk about injustices, as well as the escalating severity and degree of land dispossession under the new government.

But this seemingly simple two-word phrase is in fact very complex and opaque. It thus deserves greater clarity in order to better understand the deep layers of meaning to farmers in the historical political context of Myanmar.

More than 30 farmers from four villages in Hlaing Tharyar township protested outside the Department for Human Settlement and Housing Development (DHSHD) on Bogyoke Aung San Road this week.

The farmers had been demonstrating for more than three weeks outside the office of Wah Wah Win Company, on the corner of Anawrahta and Sintohtan streets in downtown Yangon, before shifting their attention to the DHSHD office after getting no response.

They are unhappy that the company has allegedly backtracked on a compensation promise made following protests in the middle of the year.