By: Moniroth Morm
Date: January 5th 2017
Source: Radio Free Asia
Cambodia’s environmental minister claimed this week that problems stemming from the country’s economic land concessions were solved, a notion that was called into question by a civil society organization that monitors land issues in the Southeast Asian country.
RANGOON – Around 100 Sittwe residents called for the resignation of the Arakan State parliament speaker in a Tuesday protest over unresolved cases of land confiscation, rally participants told The Irrawaddy.
The land grabs in question date as far back as the early 1990s, when Burma was governed by a military junta. Seizures of land were reportedly carried out to develop an industrial ward in the area.
By: Souha Touré
Date: December 21st 2016
Source: Ecofin Agency
(Ecofin Agency) - In order to curb land grabbing which is growing significantly, Tanzanian authorities have adopted a new land policy that brings to 33 years, from 99, the lease duration for foreigners, Eurasia Review reports.
By: Sophie Chao
Date: 12 December 2016
Source: Ecologist
Just after nine o’clock on a Tuesday morning in June, an environmental activist named Bill Kayong was shot and killed while sitting in his pickup truck, waiting for a traffic light to change in the Malaysian city of Miri, on the island of Borneo. Kayong had been working with a group of villagers who were trying to reclaim land that the local government had transferred to a Malaysian palm-oil company.
By:Sophie Mbugua
Date: 8 December 2016
Source: Thomson Reuters Foundation
WITU, Kenya (Thomson Reuters Foundation) - Too poor to buy land where they grew up on Kenya's palm-fringed southern coast, Sylvester Jefua and his wife migrated 300 kms northwards to Witu Forest, where they felled seven acres of trees and built a mud and thatch house for their family.
Ten years later, Jefua, 36, still does not feel secure.
Date: 9 December 2016
Source:NewVision
In many of the landing sites such as Nangoma, Bulebi, Kiziru and others, residents are not allowed to re-build their grass-thatched houses for fear that they will catch fire and cause further destruction but they do not offer them any other option of accommodation other than leaving the landing site.
By: Ernest Scheyder and Valerie Volcovici
Date: December 5, 2016
Source: Thomson Reuters Foundation
The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers said on Sunday it turned down a permit for a controversial pipeline project running through North Dakota, in a victory for Native Americans and climate activists who have protested against the project for months.
By: Annie Kelly
Date: December 7, 2016
Source: The Guardian
Deforestation, climate change and land rights abuse: the palm oil industry has a troubled track record. But proponents say it can be a force for good.
At a recent meeting in Panama City representatives from more than 110 Transparency International chapters and members unanimously adopted a resolution calling for corruption-free land governance worldwide.
Around the world, one in five people report that they have paid a bribe for land services; but in Africa, every second client of land administration services is affected.
By: Anastasia Moloney
Date: December 01, 2016
Source: Thomson Reuters Foundation
BOGOTA (Thomson Reuters Foundation) - Land distribution in Latin America is the most unequal in the world where only one percent of the farms and estates control more than half of the region's productive land, aid group Oxfam said on Wednesday.
By:Anastasia Moloney
Date: November 28, 2016
Source: Thomson Reuters Foundation
BOGOTA, Nov 28 (Thomson Reuters Foundation) - Water shortages caused by Bolivia's worst drought in 25 years have been exacerbated by booming population growth in cities, poor infrastructure and the impact of big agricultural plantations and mining projects, campaigners say.
