This publication deals with key issues in land tenure, especially as they relate to food insecurity and rural development situations. Land tenure issues are frequently ignored in rural development interventions, with often long-lasting, negative results. This guide is designed to assist technical officers in governments and civil society in understanding why and how land tenure issues should be considered in rural development projects. It analyses important contexts such as environmental degradation, gender discrimination, and conflicts, where land tenure is currently of critical concern.

This book examines the relationship between land tenure, conservation and rural development in the context of the Southeast Asian archipelago. In particular, it is concerned with people living in and around national parks and other protected areas. It discusses the value of reinforcing indigenous tenure and sustainable resource use practices and of including them in policies and projects that attempt to integrate conservation and development.

This open access book presents a nuanced and accessible synthesis of the relationship between land tenure security and sustainable development. Contributing authors have collectively worked for decades on land tenure as connected with conservation and development across all major regions of the globe. The first section of this volume is intended as a standalone primer on land tenure security and its connections with sustainable development. The book then explores key thematic challenges that interact directly with land tenure security, followed by a section on strategies for addressing tenure insecurity. The book concludes with a section on new frontiers in research, policy, and action. An invaluable reference for researchers in the field and for practitioners looking for a comprehensive overview of this important topic. This is an open access book.

This open access book offers unique in-depth, comprehensive, and comparative analyses of the motivations, context, and outcomes of recent land reforms in Africa. Whereas a considerable number of land reforms have been carried out by African governments since the 1990s, no systematic analysis on their meaning has so far been conducted. In the age of land reform, Africa has seen drastic rural changes. Analysing the relationship between those reforms and change, the chapters in this book reveal not only their socio-economic outcomes, such as accelerated marketisation of land, but also their political outcomes, which have often been contrasting. Countries such as Rwanda and Mozambique have utilised land reform to strengthen state control over land, but other countries, such as Ghana and Zambia, have seen the rise in power of traditional chiefs in managing the land. The comparative perspective of this book clarifies new features of African social changes, which are carefully investigated by area experts. Providing new perspectives on recent land reform, this book will have a considerable impact on scholars as well as policymakers.

Indonesia was founded on the ideal of the “Sovereignty of the People”, which suggests the pre-eminence of people’s rights to access, use and control land to support their livelihoods. Yet, many questions remain unresolved. How can the state ensure access to land for agriculture and housing while also supporting land acquisition for investment in industry and infrastructure? What is to be done about indigenous rights? Do registration and titling provide solutions? Is the land reform agenda — legislated but never implemented — still relevant? How should the land questions affecting Indonesia’s disappearing forests be resolved? The contributors to this volume assess progress on these issues through case studies from across the archipelago: from large-scale land acquisitions in Papua, to asset ownership in the villages of Sulawesi and Java, to tenure conflicts associated with the oil palm and mining booms in Kalimantan, Sulawesi and Sumatra. What are the prospects for the “people’s sovereignty” in regard to land?

Increased global demand for land posits the need for well-designed country-level land policies to protect long-held rights, facilitate land access and address any constraints that land policy may pose for broader growth. While the implementation of land reforms can be a lengthy process, the need to swiftly identify key land policy challenges and devise responses that allow the monitoring of progress, in a way that minimizes conflicts and supports broader development goals, is clear. The Land Governance Assessment Framework (LGAF) makes a substantive contribution to the land sector by providing a quick and innovative tool to monitor land governance at the country level. The LGAF offers a comprehensive diagnostic tool that covers five main areas for policy intervention: Legal and institutional framework; Land use planning, management and taxation; Management of public land; Public provision of land information; and Dispute resolution and conflict management. The LGAF assesses these areas through a set of detailed indicators that are rated on a scale of pre-coded statements (from lack of good governance to good practice). While land governance can be highly technical in nature and tends to be addressed in a partial and sporadic manner, the LGAF posits a tool for a comprehensive assessment, taking into account the broad range of issues that land governance encompasses, while enabling those unfamiliar with land to grasp its full complexity. The LGAF will make it possible for policymakers to make sense of the technical levels of the land sector, benchmark governance, identify areas that require further attention and monitor progress. It is intended to assist countries in prioritizing reforms in the land sector by providing a holistic diagnostic review that can inform policy dialogue in a clear and targeted manner. In addition to presenting the LGAF tool, this book includes detailed case studies on its implementation in five selected countries: Peru, the Kyrgyz Republic, Ethiopia, Indonesia and Tanzania.

"This book offers conceptual and empirical studies of land governance, focusing on land management approaches, land policy issues, advances in pro-poor land tenure, and land-based gender concerns. Topics include "Creating new understandings," "Exploring alternative approaches for land management and land tenure," "Viewing vistas of tenure experiences across the globe," and "Stretching the gender perspectives""--