This Topic Guide is written for DFID staff, but is relevant to all development professionals. It comprises the following sections:

This report presents the results of a rapid desk-based review of academic and grey literature on land issues in Sierra Leone, with a particular focus on literature from 2002 onwards. The review explored land ownership and rights in both the Western Area and the other provinces and the concept of land as an actual and potential driver of conflict (both violent and non-violent).

In the third of the Land Governance Booklet Series created by the NGO Uttaran, the work to identify and reduce the amount of landless people in Bangladesh is decribed.

The content of the booklet is as follows:

The Handbook on Best Practices, Security of Tenure and Access to Land--Implementation of the Habitat Agenda (2003) reviews material produced by UN Habitat partners up to and including 1999, in terms of the implementation of the Habitat Agenda. At the time of publishing, this document was the most comprehensive global overview of progress made in countries towards achieving the Habitat Agenda in the area of land tenure and land management/administration.

Everyone has a relationship to land. It is an asset that, with its associated resources, allows its owner access to loans, to build their houses and to set up small businesses in cities. In rural areas, land is essential for livelihoods, subsistence and food security. However, land is a scarce resource governed by a wide range of rights and responsibilities. And not everyone’s right to land is secure. Mounting pressure and competition mean that improving land governance - the rules, processes and organizations through which decisions are made about land - is more urgent than ever.

This publication is a practical guide to the Youth and Land Responsiveness Criteria, which is a tool that can be used to increase the incorporation of youth perspectives into land matters at both institutional and programme levels, through a participatory process.

This study aims to examine current land access and youth livelihood opportunities in Southern Ethiopia. We used survey data from the relatively land abundant districts of Oromia Region and from the land scarce districts of Southern Nations, Nationalities and Peoples' (SNNP) Region. Although access to agricultural land is a constitutional right for rural residents of Ethiopia, we found that youth in the rural south have limited potential to obtain agricultural land that can be a basis for viable livelihood. The law prohibits the purchase and sale of land in Ethiopia.

This publication is the summary of the proceedings of the Regional Learning Workshop on 'Land and Natural Resources Tenure Security' held in Nairobi, Kenya from 29-31 May 2012 as jointly organized by UN-Habitat/Global Land Tool Network and International Fund for Agricultural Development (IFAD). The aim of the workshop was to deepen the understanding of land and natural resources tenure security issues and to identify opportunities to strengthen land tenure security and land access of the rural poor and marginalized groups in sub-Saharan Africa.

Land Tenure Legislation in Timor-Leste

By Bernardo Almeida

The establishment of a formal land tenure system in Timor-Leste has been one of the most daunting challenges for the country since its independence. The post-colonial and post-conflict history has left a complex environment of conflicting land claims to which no solution has yet been found. The purpose of this article is to contribute to a better understanding of the legislation currently in force in Timor-Leste concerning (or regulating) land tenure.

Over the past 15 years, tens of millions of hectares of land have been acquired by large investors in developing countries. The Land Matrix documented 1,037 transnational land deals covering 37,842,371 hectares during this period, while many more deals remain undocumented.1 This global land rush is causing widespread forced evictions and denial of access to key land and natural resources for millions of women, small- scale food producers, pastoralists, gatherers, forest dwellers, fisherfolk, and tribal and indigenous peoples.

As in other societies in Southeast Asia
and the Pacific, customary social organization features
strongly in rural Timor-Leste. As well as providing avenues
for conflict resolution, the influence of customary systems
extends to land tenure. As the state, development partners,
private investors, non-governmental organizations (NGOs),
and others seek to promote rural development in Timor-Leste,
they will be forced to engage in some way with customary

The pattern of global land use has
important implications for the world's food and timber
supplies, bioenergy, biodiversity and other eco-system
services. However, the productivity of this resource is
critically dependent on the world's climate, as well as
investments in, and dissemination of improved technology.
This creates massive uncertainty about future land use
requirements which compound the challenge faced by