The new frontier
David K. Deng | Norwegian People’s Aid | 2011
African farmland has come under increasing pressure from commercial land-based investments in recent years. The
Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) estimates that from 2007 to 2010, foreign interests acquired 20 million
hectares of land in Africa (Graham et al. 2010). Some analysts see opportunities in this trend, asserting that if African
states are able to enact certain regulatory reforms, they can harness this surge in foreign investment to provide jobs
and development for rural communities. For decades, the agricultural sector in sub-Saharan Africa has been neglected
in both domestic public policies and development cooperation. If done responsibly, proponents argue, the influx of
foreign investment can increase public revenues and improve farmers’ access to technology and credit, leading to
a revitalization of agriculture. Others are more skeptical. Critics have dubbed it the ‘global land grab’, warning that
land acquisitions on this scale stand to deny millions of land users access to vital natural resources, undermine
food security, and exacerbate tenure insecurity. They criticize international efforts to put in place a voluntary code of
conduct for ‘whitewashing’ the problem and diverting attention away from alternative development pathways that may
be more beneficial for rural populations, such as building the productive capacity of smallholder farmers. The real
problem, these critics assert, lies in the global industrial food and energy complex which deprives rural populations
of their land in order to provide cheap food and energy production for the developed world (Borras and Franco 2010:
515).
This report was prepared as part of a baseline survey of large-scale land-based investment in Southern Sudan for
Norwegian People’s Aid (NPA). It presents data on 28 foreign and domestic investments planned or underway across
the ten states of Southern Sudan. Its purpose is to introduce policy-makers, academics and civil society in Southern
Sudan to some of the salient aspects of land investments. The data may also provide insights for the design of
initiatives to address the challenges of commercial land-based investments moving forward. Section One lays out
basic background information on the region. Section Two outlines relevant legal provisions, which in theory are meant
to regulate large-scale land investments in Southern Sudan. Section Three summarizes the research methodology.
Section Four presents the baseline data, and Section Five offers a series of preliminary observations. Section Six
concludes with recommendations for stakeholders involved with large-scale land investments in Southern Sudan to
consider moving forward.
Language | English
The new frontier