February 2, 2022 (GLOBAL) — Six years into the establishment of the 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), the Land Portal is re-examining progress made on land-related SDG indicators. More than a dozen land-related indicators are housed over five SDG goals. The newly updated SDG Land Tracker features completely revised and updated narratives for 13 land-related indicators describing why the indicator is important and how the indicators are measured and monitored.

Amahoro @ Scale (Peace-at- Scale) is the Burundi country project of the larger “LAND -at- Scale” program funded by RVO (The Netherlands Enterprise Agency) which is currently active in 14 countries in Africa, Latin America, the Middle East and Asia.

This free e-learning course shows how to gather data for Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) indicator 1.4.2, which monitors security of land tenure rights.

The course is aimed at officers of national statistics organizations, land registries among others, responsible for collecting and reporting official national data on land tenure security, as well as other stakeholders involved in monitoring of land governance and tenure security.

The Netherlands Agency for Enterprise and Development (RVO) is pleased to announce its collaboration with the Embassy of the Kingdom of the Netherlands (EKN) in Bamako, SNV, the Royal Tropical Institute (KIT), the University of Legal and Political Sciences of Bamako and the National Coordination of Peasant Organizations for implementation of a LAND-at-scale project in Mali "Strengthening local capacities to manage land conflicts and protect customary rights". The intervention will run until 2023 and has a budget of €1.3 million.

Almost half (46%) of investors surveyed in sub-Saharan Africa have experienced disputes with local communities over land, new research from the ODI and TMP Systems has found.

As part of an ongoing initiative to facilitate responsible land investment, experts have warned companies are failing to avoid serious risks both to themselves and local communities, even though it makes financial sense to do so.

The Netherlands Enterprise & Development Agency (RVO), the Netherlands Embassy in Kampala (EKN), the United Nations Human Settlements Programme (UN-Habitat) and the Global Land Tool Network (GLTN) are pleased to announce their collaboration for a LAND-at-scale project in Uganda. In a virtual signing ceremony on September 9th, the partnership was made official.

The State Minister for Lands Sam Mayanja has responded to critics who accuse him of spearheading a plot by government to abolish the Mailo land tenure system and replace it with a freehold land tenure system. Mayanja has explained that the new proposals are instead aimed at strengthening ownership of land by the tenants on Mailo land so that they can acquire freehold land titles in perpetuity.

Kenyans with complaints about historical land injustices have until September 20th this year to submit their grievances to the National Land Commission. A section of rights groups believe that Kenyans have not been sensitized enough on the matter, calling for urgent measures to ensure no one is locked out.

Centro Terra Viva, Terra Firma Lda and the Netherlands Enterprise Agency (RVO) are excited to announce their partnership for a LAND-at-scale project in Mozambique. Starting this year, the project will run for three years focusing on three components, namely scaling community legal literacy, land rights certification and increasing climate resilience.

In May 2021, the numbers of households whose land rights have been secured with the support by the Global Programme Responsible Land Policy have reached a peak: Thanks to the hard work of our partners and project teams, 110.163 households had their land legally documented by then, corresponding to about  550.000 people directly benefitting.