News and output

Farmers’ organizations and land policies
LANDac partner Agriterra, in cooperation with the East African Farmers Federation (EAFF), has set up a short-term research project on the role of farmers’ organizations in policymaking on land governance in Uganda. The study looks at the existing strategies and institutional arrangements in different regions that have varying underlying causes for increased pressure on land, such as urbanization, oil exploitation etc. The types of actors involved in processes of land transactions, the existing strategies and institutional arrangements are studied. Vertical and horizontal linkages that formal and informal membership organizations make use of, and the way in which...

From 8-19 July 2013 LANDac organises the fourth Utrecht Summerschool Land Governance for Development. 

The two-week intensive course will introduce students to the multiple dimensions of land governance in Africa, Asia, Latin America and beyond. Students will acquire the most up-to-date knowledge on new land pressures and learn how to place these in broader theoretical debates. In addition, they will learn about best practices in land governance from different contexts and on different levels: local, national and international. The guiding question is how to optimize the link between land governance, sustainable development and poverty alleviation. At the end of this course students will have a thorough knowledge of current...

On 28 November 2012, LANDac and Oxfam Novib organised a round-table discussion on Free Prior and Informed Consent in the context of land governance, with Marcus Colchester (Director Forest Peoples Programme) as the main presenter and Kristen Genovese (Center for International Environmental Law) as a discussant. The event took place at the  Ministry of Foreign Affairs in The Hague and was attended by about 25 representatives from NGOs, policy and academia. 
 
A report of the roundtable discussion is available here.
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Recently various institutions have released reports on land governance and large-scale land acquisitions. Some of the main recent reports are mentioned here:

Deutsche Bank (DB Research). Foreign investment in farmland. No low-hanging fruit. November 2012.
 
Oxfam. ‘Our Land, Our Lives’.  Time out on the global land rush. October 2012. 
 
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LANDac partners currently emphasize two subjects in their research activities:
 
1) The role of civil society (e.g. farmers' organizations) in dealing with large-scale land acquisitions and related issues 
2) Responsible investment in land: are there lessons to be learned from good practices?
 
More information will follow soon.

In July 2012 LANDac organised the third Utrecht Summerschool Land Governance for Development. The two-week intensive course  introduced students to the multiple dimensions of land governance in Africa, Asia, Latin America and beyond. 25 Students from 16 different countries all over the world participated in the summerschool. They acquired up-to-date knowledge from LANDac partners and guest lecturers on new land pressures, theoretical debates, and best practices in land governance. A more extensive report will follow soon; the programme can be found here. LANDac will organise the summerschool again in 2013.

The 2011-2012 European Report on Development  "Confronting Scarcity: Managing water, energy and land for inclusive and sustainable growth" and accompanying papers are now available online here.  Various LANDac partners (Utrecht University, Royal Tropical Institute, Ministry of Foreign Affairs) have contributed to the report with a number of research papers on the issue of land.

2 - 13 July 2012
Utrecht University, the Netherlands
 
In July 2012 LANDac organises the third Utrecht Summerschool Land Governance for Development. The two-week intensive course will introduce students to the multiple dimensions of land governance in Africa, Asia, Latin America and beyond. Students will acquire the most up-to-date knowledge on new land pressures and learn how to place these in broader theoretical debates. In addition, they will learn about best practices in land governance from different contexts and on different levels: local, national and international. The course is useful for Masters' students, academics and practitioners from anywhere in the world who are interested in or work...

Report now available:
NEW DONORS, NEW INVESTMENTS: NEW DEVELOPMENT? Beyond the Millennium Development Goals  8th Knowledge for development conference, Utrecht, January 27, 2012

This seminar, organized by IDS (Utrecht University), LANDac, HIVOS, FNV Mondiaal, IOB (Antwerp University) and SID, aimed to critically assess the meaning of development in the context of contemporary transformations such as the increased involvement of giants like India and China in development cooperation and the increased role of southern countries in international investment flows. Some key questions were: How do...

In September 2011, Oxfam International presented the report “Land and Power”, which discusses the local implications of the global rush for fertile land by companies, and argues that international companies can and should assume responsibility for protecting local rights when deciding to invest in land (see attachment).This report has generated wide media interest and questions have also been asked in parliament. LANDac, the IS academy on land governance and the Ministry of Foreign Affairs invited Oxfam to present the report. Next, three organisations and initiatives that support Dutch private sector interest in developing countries, with financial support from BuZa were invited to comment on the report. These are...

Article in the Wall Street Journal on Argentina's plans to limit foreign land acquisition (Matt Moffett - 1 September 2011). Dr. Irma Mosquera (Utrecht University) was interviewed about the judicial aspects of foreign land acquisition.