The USAID-funded Land for Prosperity Activity  is developing capacity in land administration across all levels of government to strengthen land rights in underfunded municipalities across Colombia.

Ensuring secure land tenure is crucial for improving land development, as both local and foreign investors often hesitate to engage in land transactions when there is uncertainty about ownership rights. The term "Land Tenure Insecurity" refers to the apprehension that someone else might claim ownership of the purchased land in the future, creating a significant risk for investment. This phenomenon is particularly common in the Sub-Saharan African Region of which Ghana is no exception. The positive impact of land tenure security is far-reaching.

Titulación de tierras: la solución de siempre

Por Pedro José Castillo Castañeda[1]

Overcoming Land Disputes by Fostering Relationships in Communities: Experiences from Zambia’s Systematic Land Titling Program

Written by Dimuna Phiri and Kamiji Malasha

Unresolved disputes and disorder, can be addressed through the judicial system. However, the process is expensive, slow, unscalable, and does not focus on reconciling individuals, families and communities. Through the lens of beneficiaries, this article reveals the importance of alternative dispute resolution in land reforms, particularly adjudication committees.

USAID is supporting the government with a strategy to create municipal land offices that manage local land administration campaigns and deliver land titles to rural Colombians

WHY REJECT CUSTOMARY LAND PRIVATISATION 

Most of the world’s land is still stewarded by communities under customary systems. Billions of people rely on communally managed farmland, pasture, forests and savannahs for their livelihoods. 

This collective management of resources is viewed in the colonial or capitalist economic model as an obstacle to individual wealth creation and private profit. 

Environmental policy interventions often result in conflicts because they fail to recognize people’s identity and sense of belongings, as shaped through the places where they live. A recent paper explores a case study of a palm oil project in East Kalimantan, Indonesia, in which competing claims of recognition and land rights have led to conflict between transmigrants and indigenous Kutai people.

Closing the gender gap worldwide could reduce hunger for 100 million people and yet Zambian women have unequal rights to land, a fundamental building block of food security and poverty reduction. Women face multiple challenges that limit their ability to realise secure land rights, including social, cultural, economic, and political factors. Inequality and uncertainty in accessing, controlling, and owning property for women deprives them of the opportunity to participate in national economic development, and negatively impacts our country as a whole.

The pandemic has shown the Colombian government how structural land issues continue to hamper rural development.

Colombia’s hospitals have been challenged due to Covid-19, and while the government rushes to strengthen the country’s healthcare system, intensive care unit occupancy remains high throughout the pandemic.

During the recent Conference on Land Policy in Africa, we had a chance to sit down and speak with Professor Howard Stein of the University of Michigan. Scroll below to read more.  

1) Can you tell us a little bit about your research, work and background? 

Local communities manage a significant portion of the world’s remaining forests, pastures, and fisheries as common property resources, but they are rarely recognized as formal owners. Important progress has occurred during the last twenty years, as growing evidence suggests that devolving rights to communities can provide incentives for new forms of investment that facilitate sustainable outcomes as well as greater equity in the distribution of benefits.

Considering that land tenure security is crucial to better outcomes for women it is a surprise that there is not more evidence out there on what works to achieve it.