Based on worldwide experience and encouraging evidence from country pilots in African countries such as Ghana, Malawi, Mozambique, Tanzania,and Uganda, this new report suggests a series of ten steps that may help to revolutionise agricultural production and eradicate poverty in Africa. These steps include improving tenure security over individual and communal lands, increasing land access and tenure for poor and vulnerable families, resolving land disputes, managing better public land, and increasing efficiency and transparency in land administration services. 

This report discusses the potential benefits of, and the current challenges for, agricultural land investment in Tanzania and Mozambique. The paper finds that there is little, if any, development potential in these investments. Indeed, the economic growth potential of investments in agricultural land is questionable due to an inadequate regulatory framework governing foreign direct investments (FDI) in the sector.

This article begins with an investigation into woodland management in Mali and moves onto a discussion of some of the fundamental practical problems associated with a major part of forest policy in Mali.

Angola, like Mozambique, inherited its legal framework from the Portuguese Civil Code, which was not based on a traditional African concept of community occupation under customary law. With Portuguese settlement, large areas of land were appropriated for and incorporated into the colonial cadastre (the formally surveyed and officially recorded land boundaries of the land concessions granted by the state). After winning independence from Portugal in 1975 the new Angolan government, influenced by socialist principles, affirmed the constitutional role of the state as the owner of all land.

Built on earlier quantitative assessment of the socio-economic drivers of the above changes, this paper focuses on the role of national level policies implemented in the area over the past decades, and how these have affected the traditional institutional setting that determines land use, property rights and pathways of livestock development.The paper uses a literature review combined with in-depth key informant and group interviews to identify key policies and interventions, assess their impacts and explore the responses and strategies adopted at both individual and community levels to cop

What are the dynamics of land tenure in the CAS (Conda, Ambuim, and Sumbe) area in Angola? What are its opportunities and risks? This paper reveals a denial of land access rights to communal farmers, whose livelihoods are centred on land.

This paper looks at the role of market imperfections in explaining leasing behaviour of households using sample data from the Highlands of Eritrea. It looks at the tenancy or land rental market, the position of households in that market (as landlords, tenants or non-participants) and assesses the transaction costs related to the adjustment process in the tenancy market.The paper tests for fixed and variable transaction costs related to adjustment in the land rental market. A two-stage approach for participation in the market as landlords or tenants is used for this.

This article discusses the case for an international treaty on animal genetic resources, confirming that one-third of the world’s livestock breeds are now endangered.

How Africans access – or ‘own’ – their landholdings is a matter of profound importance for the continent’s future. It touches on social welfare as well as prospects for economic development. This policy briefing provides an overview of the land question, drawing heavily on the Country Review Reports (CRRs) of the African Peer Review Mechanism (APRM). It argues that weak property rights are a major problem for Africa, but cautions against an assumption that full titling is an immediate solution.

Tries to understand the case for redistributive land reforms. Argues that there is relatively persuasive evidence showing that redistributing land may promote equity as well as efficiency. Suggest that it is, nevertheless, unclear, given that all forms of redistribution cost money as well as bureaucratic and political capital, that redistributing land is the best way to redistribute.The second part of the paper takes as given that policymakers want to redistribute land, and discusses strategies for achieving such redistribution.

This paper summarises the findings of a short exercise to identify land issues in present-day Afghanistan.

Tenure and claims over forests and land are highly contested throughout Asia where states retain full ownership of land. Competition for land for investment, resource extraction, and conservation is becoming more common. The conflict takes place between local communities and indigenous peoples and external Government agencies and developers. This paper sheds light on how conflict begins, how it affects actors involved and how it can be successfully managed.