ROME, Feb 25 (IPS) – Agricultural land has been one of the most important sources of security for generations. Pearl S. Buck wrote about China almost a century ago The good earth“If you keep your land, you can live.” That still applies today. If farmers own land, they invest in it. If they don’t, they get what they can today, without thinking about tomorrow.
This decision at household level becomes a large-scale structural problem: land degradation – today 1.7 billion people live in areas of enormous size declining agricultural productivity – reflects systemic underinvestment in land, often rooted in insecure land ownership. The good news is that this means that land tenure reform and enforcement can be a powerful tool to combat land degradation and food insecurity.
Globally, that’s only about a quarter of the country formally recognized. In sub-Saharan Africa, where traditional systems dominate land ownership, communities are exposed to encroachment, weak dispute resolution, and exclusion from services and finance. More than 1.1 billion people believe so rights could be lost to their country over the next five years. This perceived uncertainty has increased due to increasing financial pressure and displacement.
Evidence of Ghana And Malawi shows that farmers with informal or seasonal leases are significantly less likely to invest in soil restoration, water management or productivity-enhancing practices. This is because they could lose access to the land before these investments generate returns over several years. Without land as collateral, farmers also struggle to access credit, insurance and financial services needed to finance such improvements.Customary systems have consistently disadvantaged women, who make up half of small producers, in terms of inheritance and transfer rights. Women worldwide are standing strong only 15% of agricultural land, and even if they do, they risk losing it in the event of divorce or death of a spouse.
Limited legal access to land, combined with weak access to credit, insurance and raw materials, has reinforced cycles of low productivity, land degradation and vulnerability for women farmers.
Where land ownership is weak or contested, rising demand for land can fuel conflict. In Colombia, agricultural expansion into forest areas occurred after the conflict tensions generated where land claims remain unresolved. Similar disputes have arisen in parts of sub-Saharan Africa, where weak legal recognition of customary rights and uncertain land claims mean that households vulnerable to land conflicts, especially when large-scale land acquisitions take place.
These recurring tensions have strengthened the case for strengthening land management as a basis for stability and development. In fact, about 70 countries have taken the initiative land policy reforms since 2012, when the UN endorsed internationally agreed principles to protect legitimate property rights, including customary ones. But many legal reforms have been slow to translate into practice. Dispute resolution systems remain weak, and the rights of women, indigenous peoples and traditional landowners continue to be inconsistently recognized.
Change couldn’t come sooner. Even 10% of the affected cropland is being turned back could feed An additional 154 million people every year. Without government intervention, the world could cope a shortage of agricultural land twice the size of India in 2050.
Of course, secure land ownership alone will not automatically restore the land. That is half of the world’s agricultural land controlled by the top 1% of producers, many of whom use intensive production models that could accelerate land degradation if not accompanied by strong environmental safeguards. Land tenure reform must therefore be accompanied by effective regulation, targeted incentives, access to financing and extension services, and strong institutional capacity.
Rising land demand, climate stress and large-scale land acquisitions will continue to test the sustainability of these reforms. Whether these pressures translate into instability or resilience depends on policy choices. If governments want farmers to restore the land, they must first ensure that farmers can keep it.
© Inter Press Service (20260225141803) — All rights reserved. Original source: Inter Press Service
#property #reforms #key #reducing #land #degradation