Land grab or development opportunity
L. Cotula, S. Vermeulen, R. Leonard and J. Ke | FAO, IIED and IFAD | 2009
Over the past 12 months, large-scale acquisitions of farmland in Africa, Latin
America, Central Asia and Southeast Asia have made headlines in a flurry of
media reports across the world. Lands that only a short time ago seemed of little
outside interest are now being sought by international investors to the tune of
hundreds of thousands of hectares. And while a failed attempt to lease
1.3 million ha in Madagascar has attracted much media attention, deals
reported in the international press constitute the tip of the iceberg. This is rightly
a hot issue because land is so central to identity, livelihoods and food security.
Despite the spate of media reports and some published research,
international land deals and their impacts remain still little understood. This
report is a step towards filling this gap. The outcome of a collaboration
between IIED, FAO and IFAD, the report discusses key trends and drivers in
land acquisitions, the contractual arrangements underpinning them and the
way these are negotiated, as well as the early impacts on land access for rural
people in recipient countries. The report looks at large-scale land acquisitions,
broadly defined as acquisitions (whether purchases, leases or other) of land
areas over 1,000 ha. While international land deals are emerging as a global
phenomenon, this report focuses on sub-Saharan Africa.
The report draws on a literature review; on qualitative interviews with key
informants internationally; on national inventories of approved and proposed
land acquisitions since 2004 in five African countries (Ethiopia, Ghana,
Madagascar, Mali and Sudan), as well as qualitative case studies in
Mozambique and Tanzania; and on legal analysis of applicable law and of a
small sample of land deals.
Sprache | English
Land grab or development opportunity