Official report of the East African LANDNET Africa meeting held in Kenya in August 2000. Summarises welcoming remarks, the keynote address by H.W.O. Okoth-Ogendo, and thematic presentations on women’s land rights in eastern Africa, common property networking at the global level, and land tenure networking issues in Rwanda. Also sub-regional LANDNET Africa updates, and country land tenure networking updates from Rwanda, Uganda, Tanzania and Kenya, plus identification of priority issues and future plans. Lists addresses of participants and the workshop programme.

International comparative study of strategies for settlement support provision to land reform beneficiaries by Susan Tilley (RR26);

A critical review of the directions that post-conflict state-building is taking, particularly the implications for post-conflict land administration that current approaches are mandating as the ‘correct’ approach. Influenced by the author’s work for UN agencies on local government and land issues in Liberia and Somaliland.

Argues the need for long term perspectives on implementing land reforms, to address people’s perceptions and practices, to decentralise authority to the local level, and to mainstream women’s rights into every activity relating to land, land administration and land dispute settlement.

Includes key policy areas; the legal framework governing land in Malawi; the Green Belt initiative and the New Alliance: threats or development opportunities?; case studies of large-scale acquisitions in Malawi – out-grower schemes in Nkhotakota and Chikwawa districts; recommendations. Brief illustrates the further accelerate land concentration among local elites and the exposure of many to landlessness and food insecurity.

Includes abstract, introduction, the Land Act 1979, land ownership, grant of title to land, need for land policy, current land reform proposals, draft White Paper proposals, and strategic options – access to land, land markets, participation.

Presentation to an international workshop on Making Land Rights More Secure held in Ouagadougou.

Covers the Tribal Land Act, tribal land administration, customary law, Land Boards, some long-standing issues, problems encountered. Concludes that there are serious problems concerning the administration of tribal land, mainly due to poor governance and ill-advised changes to the Tribal Land Act and its regulations.

Focuses on communal tenure reform developments (or lack thereof), referring to law, policy and practice in rural areas in South Africa. Shows that communal land tenure is not in a healthy state and discusses the following recent laws and policies that are symptoms of this ill health: the Communal Land Rights Act (struck down by the Constitutional Court); the Traditional Leadership and Governance Framework Act (passed in 2003); and the 2014 Communal Land Tenure ‘wagon wheel’ policy (currently in place).

Covers land use patterns in the Cotton Belt – joint venture companies, smallholders and privados, research questions and characteristics of the 5 study zones, smallholder perceptions of land tenure security and experiences with conflict in the Cotton Belt. Challenges widely held beliefs about land tenure and access in the smallholder sector in Mozambique. Provisions in the new legal framework will not be sufficient to eliminate or adjudicate land conflicts between smallholders. The research results reveal significant variation in the size of household landholdings.

Includes uneven implementation, to title or not to title?, a demand-driven land reform please, a decoupled land administration structure, don’t forget the villages, Tanzania’s new wave land reform, recommendations. Argues that much could be achieved if higher level authorities and NGOs systematically strengthened the village authorities and enabled them to deliver their services. But as long as this level is forgotten, land reform will not work in practice.

Includes key issues; the rise of development-induced displacements; key findings on the resettlement process; evaluating the proposed National Resettlement Policy; recommendations. Brief argues reforms need to be cognisant of the ways and means in which communities have been displaced and resettled in recent cases of land-based investments, and learn lessons from them.