Land tenure and International Investments in agriculture
New UN report on food crisis and the global land grab
In the midst of a raging famine in the Horn of Africa and continuing expansion of land grabbing across the Global South, a new and critical report has been released by the High Level Panel of Experts on Food Security and Nutrition, of the Committee on World Food Security.
TNI Fellow Jun Borras is a co-author of the study, together with Camilla Toulmin, Esther Mwangi, Prem Bindraban and Sergio Sauer. Among the findings include:
- No evidence of ‘pro-poor, win-win’ scenarios in these land deals;
- Negative impacts on communities where such land deals are carried out;
- Majority of land deals are not linked to food production, but for the production of biofuels and other industrial products such as timber;
- Major land deals occur not just in Africa, but worldwide; involving not just transnational capital, but domestic capital as well;
- It is most likely that the trend in land grabbing will continue and escalate in the future, and might lead to renewed conflicts.
The study has recommended a set of policy reforms, including renewed support for diversified smallholder agriculture and the strengthening of the UN World Committee on Food Security institutional mechanisms such as the Voluntary Guidelines in land governance. The land grab report will be a key document during the 37th Session of the UN CFS when it convenes in October 2011 in Rome.
For further queries, you may contact Jun Borras: borras@iss.nl
About the authors
Jun Borras
Saturnino 'Jun' M Borras Jr. is a political activist and academic who has been deeply involved in rural social movements in the Philippines and internationally since the early 1980s. Borras was part of the core organising team that established the international peasant movement La Via Campesina and has written extensively on land issues and agrarian movements. Jun is also Adjunct Professor, COHD at China Agricultural University, Beijing; a Fellow for Food First/Institute for Food and Development Policy in California and Coordinator for Initiatives in Critical Agrarian Studies (ICAS).
Recent publications from Agrarian Justice
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The Sugarcane Industry and the global economic crisisAn examination of ethanol production in Brazil, highlighting the role of financial capital, the territorial expansion of agribusiness and the impacts on labour relations and indigenous peoples and peasant farmers. |
A foreseeable disasterWhy despite ten years of accumulating evidence on the social and environmental cost of agrofuels, does the European Commission persist with its failed policies? An analysis of the EU's bioeconomy vision, how it is fuelling land grabs in Africa, the agrofuels lobby that drives policy, and the alternative visions for energy that are being ignored. |
UPDATE: Land concentration, land grabbing and people’s struggles in EuropeLand issues and 'land grabs' are mostly associated with the global South, however 13 country studies in this updated landmark report reveal an accelerating grab and concentration of land across Europe. |
