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Better Together

Posted on by Amrit Bhandari

Strong and meaningful land tenure begins with national, regional and local government coordination.

Voices of Local Leaders

Colombia’s bureaucratic public administration system is an obstacle for rural municipalities to connect with the national government, especially in the poorest and most conflict-affected regions. Communication and administrative bottlenecks prevent much needed funding from reaching Colombia’s most vulnerable, underdeveloped areas and hamper the implementation of Territorial Economic Development Plans (PDET), a key tool to boost investment and development in these regions, which also honors commitments for comprehensive rural reform in the 2016 Peace Accord.

“Let’s Click” for the PDET —an initiative created by USAID, the Agency for Territorial Renewal (ART) and the Presidential Counselor for Stabilization, Emilio Archila— seeks to link local priorities with national resources and relevant cooperation programs funded by USAID. It also helps streamline support to avoid redundancy and increase the efficiency of investments.

Last year, USAID’s Land for Prosperity Activity participated in Let’s Click meetings with ART regional officials and elected leaders from several municipalities: The Mayor of Tumaco, 11 municipalities in Catatumbo, 15 in Montes de María, 4 municipalities in Southern Tolima and the Governor of Sucre.

In a meeting with municipal leaders of Southern Tolima, USAID presented its activities and offered technical assistance which aligns with the priorities and needs expressed in their PDETs. Public officials proved eager to continue coordinating with USAID, picking up where past initiatives have left off, such as in land tenure, government strengthening, and tertiary roads.

The mayors from Ataco, Planadas, Chaparral, and Rioblanco also presented USAID-funded tertiary road inventories to the Ministry of Transportation. The ministry is currently selecting the priority tertiary roads to receive attention and funding. USAID is also partnering the the ART to improve private public partnerships in the coffee and cocoa value chains in Southern Tolima.


“We see the PDET territorial approach as the ideal long term solution to consolidate peace in Colombia because of the government’s will to push projects forward”
-Lawrence Sacks, USAID Mission Director in Colombia

The mayors of rural PDET municipalities agree that strengthening land tenure and property formalization are key drivers of stabilizing their territories. Over the past five years, PDET communities have continually requested improved land administration in order to update rural land cadasters and issue property titles. Multipurpose cadaster programs designed with USAID support and led by Colombia’s National Land Agency have become the roadmaps that align all levels of government, build the capacity, and inform the community.

In 2019, Colombia’s President Ivan Duque set lofty goals for supporting land policies and updating the country’s rural cadaster. Today a little more than 20% of the country’s cadaster is updated, and the government aims to reach 60% by 2022 and 100% by 2024.

“The Ovejas Pilot (massive land formalization) is proof that land titling, property, financial inclusion, and agriculture strengthening programs can be a reality.”

-Iván Duque, President of Colombia

For the better part of the past four years, USAID has harmonized inter-institutional coordination and partnerships with the National Land Agency (ANT), the Agustin Codazzi Geographic Institute (IGAC), the Superintendence of Notary and Registry (SNR), the National Planning Department (DNP), municipality leaders, and communities. 

Land titling serves to transform the local economy by strengthening state presence, triggering public and private investments, and providing local governments with tools for land use and administration. On an individual level, land titling is the first step toward land security and citizen property rights, decreasing people’s vulnerability to displacement. A property title also allows farmers to access subsidies and financial services.

 

 

Private Actors Making Public Efforts

Posted on by Amrit Bhandari

The private sector can do much more than serve markets and create jobs. It is essential for a country’s development and social empowerment.

Formalizing schools allows local governments to mobilize resources towards education in their municipalities.

Many believe that the root of armed conflict in Colombia comes down to land tenure. Land is a key asset to boost economic development, rural transformation, and legal opportunities. This is why the first and most significant aspect of the Peace Accord signed between the Government of Colombia (GOC) and the former FARC guerilla calls for a comprehensive rural reform. This includes democratizing access to land and mass formalization of 7 million rural parcels, that could benefit thousands of rural families and improve their quality of life.

Given the importance of land for rural transformation, Colombia’s government has designed actions and strategies to implement multipurpose and participatory land rights management projects. However, these actions surpass institutional capacity in both human and financial resources. A task this colossal requires for all actors in society to participate, which is why the private sector’s involvement in formalization efforts is so important, not only because of the investments it can make, but mainly because its involvement in long term rural development would ensure the sustainability of formal land markets.

USAID believes in the power of private participation as a driver of social development. As such, the Land for Prosperity Activity

Land for Prosperity visited Proantioquia in February in the hopes of joining forces with the Ser + Maestro initiative, which seeks to strengthen teacher’s capacities in Bajo Cauca. Later, it met with the full board of ProAntioquia, together with USAIDs Mission Director Larry Sacks and the newly elected Governor of Antioquia, to present the Program and its goals for the Department. As a result of those conversations, and the enthusiastic support of both private and public officials, on March 3rd, USAID, the Governor’s Office of Antioquia, the National Land Agency, the private sector through Proantioquia and the Mayoral Office of Cáceres signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) to join efforts to formalize public schools in Antioquia, implement massive formalization, rural development, and strengthen local capacity for land governance.

Proantioquia is a private foundation created by large companies from Antioquia, working for sustainable business development in 160 municipalities throughout several departments. It gathers some of the largest companies in Colombia, including Bancolombia (the country’s largest bank), Grupo Éxito (one of the largest retail chains) and Argos (cement producer and one of the most important players in infrastructure projects nation-wide). Its participation in formalization efforts is not only relevant but also innovative: by signing the MOU, the organization became a pioneer in private participation in a topic that has been at the forefront of peace-building efforts.

“The company must be seen as an entity whose purpose goes beyond revenue; it aims to create social capital and public value.”

-Felipe Aramburo, Proantioquia

Its engagement not only marks the possibility of funding from the private sector but also guarantees sustainability of the actions since these efforts in formalization of public schools will ultimately enable local administrations to mobilize resources to enhance educational infrastructure and the quality of the services schools provide. This is especially important in Cáceres, one of the Activity’s target territories prioritized by USAID and the Colombian government as one of the three municipalities of the high level policy dialogue between Colombia and the US government due to the large presence of illegal crops and active armed actors which, together with stagnant development, creates a cycle of poverty, violence and exclusion that is difficult to escape from.

“This is an opportunity for Cáceres. By signing the MOU, the community feels like it is taken into account and that there is willing to work towards territorial development.”-Rodolfo Bastidas, the principal of the Gaspar de Rodas school in Cáceres, Antioquia.

This MoU is the beginning of a new approach that aims to bring a key actor into the mix of socio-economic development. Helping to formalize schools and bring education to the forefront of community building is a game-changer for a complex municipality like Cáceres. “We are fully aware of the power land policies have to transform regions, and what better way to start than by formalizing schools”, said US Ambassador to Colombia, Philip S. Goldberg.

The involvement of USAID in these processes can plant the seed of sustainability for formalization efforts and encourage other private actors to join similar initiatives in Antioquia and beyond. The region of Bajo Cauca in Antioquia concentrates a number of USAID funded Programs working in a coordinated manner, with the Governor’s office to maximize impact of cooperation initiatives.

Mr. Aramburo explains it best when he says: “Signing this MOU is an invitation for the private sector to join efforts to prioritize land formalization in the public agenda. USAID can help with an initial boost so that the government, private sector and other actors join in and make these starting efforts sustainable in the long term.”

“I want to say this to other municipalities around the country: embrace these efforts and support these processes. Do what you must in your territories to improve the education of your community, so they can in turn contribute to the development of the region.”

-Rodolfo Bastidas, Principle of the Gaspar de Rodas school in Cáceres

 

 

USAID Brief Reveals Linkages between Gender-Based Violence and Documentation of Women’s Land Rights

Posted on by Amrit Bhandari

Different forms of GBV are linked to land documentation, including economic violence such as a denial of land access, ownership, and inheritance rights, forced displacement, and property grabbing. Banner Photo credit CLEMENT CHIRWA – TETRA TECH

A USAID brief, published to mark 16 Days of Activism against Gender-Based Violence, reveals important lessons from land rights registration activities in Zambia

Securing women’s land rights is an important global development goal and has been linked to significant gains in women’s economic empowerment and community development. At the same time, the process of documenting these rights can create resentment and increase conflict not only between spouses, but also within families and communities, often leading to gender-based violence. This is one of the overarching lessons gleaned from land documentation data collected by USAID in recent years.

Photo credit CLEMENT CHIRWA – TETRA TECH

When the opportunity to register land rights is introduced to a rural community, it can create a sense of urgency and prompt people to confirm land boundaries and resolve long-standing disputes over ownership through a rapid process, risking the exclusion of people from registering their rights, especially vulnerable groups such as elderly and single women and women with disabilities.

“We have come to realize there is a damned-if-you-do and a damned-if-you-don’t dynamic at play. Either women are excluded from land, which is a form of gender-based violence, or if they assert their rights, they are subjected to other forms of violence ” explains Patricia Malasha, Zambia Gender and Social Inclusion Advisor for the USAID-funded program Integrated Land and Resource Governance (ILRG) and one of the authors of the brief.

“We can’t just ignore gender based violence in land documentation.”

For the last five years, USAID has promoted customary land documentation in Zambia, supporting partners to document the land rights using Mobile Approaches to Secure Tenure (MAST). This has resulted in registration of over 30,000 parcels of land benefiting 50,000 people, of whom nearly half are women. The approach is socially inclusive and promotes gender integration to ensure that women’s land rights are registered.

Since 2019, USAID’s local partners have collected qualitative data and stories on gender-based violence while documenting customary land. The results, presented in the brief Gender-Based Violence and Land Documentation and Administration in Zambia, provide useful lessons and recommendations that have the strength to inform and guide how rights documentation processes proceed.

The personal stories illustrated in the brief are powerful examples demonstrating that the protective role of secure land rights and their ability to increase women’s power to renegotiate relationships is not straightforward. Well-intentioned pressure to reach high targets of parcels documented in short periods of time can increase the risk of conflict within communities, as well as gender-based violence. Similarly, pushing for the inclusion of women in land records or joint titling without engaging in parallel work to address broader gender norms may inadvertently put women at risk.

The brief was published in order to continue the dialogue around gender-based violence and as part of the International Day Against Violence Against Women on November 25, and the following 16 Days of Activism that finalize on Human Rights Day, December 10.

USAID will continue to identify and mitigate risks related to gender-based violence and its relationship to land rights registration activities over the next three years under the USAID Integrated Land and Resource Governance Program across intervention countries.

Click Here To Download The Full Brief

 

 

In Mozambique, Building Trust Through Land Rights

Posted on by Amrit Bhandari

Ácia and Abílio, once at odds over land boundaries, share a moment in Ácia’s field. Banner Photo: Rena Singer/World Bank
This blog was written by Paula Pimentel, Senior Agricultural Research & Technology Transfer Advisor of the USAID, Mozambique, and originally published on World Bank Blogs. The story is also available in the Portuguese language.

Researchers are increasingly recognizing the role of trust in economic development around the world.

Trust fuels economic development and a lack of trust slows it. Indeed, geographies where trust is lacking are the least economically advanced, as this next graphic illustrates.

You’ll find many Sub-Saharan African countries crowded in the bottom left side of the graphic.

This is the story of how one village in Mozambique is building trust to climb out of that corner. And this story is unfolding in hundreds of villages across the region, and holds lessons for how other communities and countries can make the same ascent.

In 2018, the 4,593 residents of Meitor Mozambique established a community association called “Okaviherinwa Orera,” which means “to be helped is good” in the local language.

It was an unexpected and remarkable turn of events for a community which has a long and troubled history of violence and infighting. Augustino Mulakiwa, who leads the association, remembers the time in 1976 when a dispute over land boundaries led one resident to poison another’s well.  Retributions followed from both sides of the dispute, until the dead numbered 20 people. While the high number of deceased that year was unusual, said Mulakiwa, it was in other ways very typical – conflicts over land have driven anger and violence in his community for decades as a result of insecure land rights.

Meitor residents, like those of most other farming villages across Mozambique, and Sub-Saharan Africa more broadly, farm the land their parents passed down to them or land they purchased on a handshake, its contours and boundaries only rarely noted on paper.

This lack of documentation creates conflict that costs lives and dreams.

When a handshake is not enough

This was the case for Ácia Alberto Sicanso and her husband Patrício Carlo, who bought their farm for 2,000 Meticais (about $30) on a handshake in 2014.

Ácia and Patrício holding the documentation of their property boundary. Photo: Rena Singer/World Bank

The problems started almost immediately when their neighbor, Abílio Alcate, planted her cassava rows about 12 feet inside the boundary of their farm. Abílio said the young couple were mistaken about the boundary. Ácia and Patrício asked the former owner to intervene. He declined to get involved. The couple appealed to Mulakiwa, who had no luck resolving the conflict.

Eventually, after lost time and harvests, the couple rented themselves out as laborers for a few days to raise the money they needed to take Abílio to court. Given that no one in this village had any documents describing their property lines, the court was unable to come to a decision.

It was deeply disappointing for Ácia and Patrício. With four hungry children, they could ill afford the lost income from the court case and the lost rows of cassava year after year.

Technology steps in

Relief came in 2017 when USAID and DFID began efforts to document farmers’ land in the area. Through the programs, USAID and its partners train villagers to map property boundaries with the help of handheld GPS devices. Together, neighbors walk the perimeter of their farms, noting GPS coordinates to create a digital map. Each farmer receives a document that notes their farm’s description, location, owner and names of witnesses. USAID’s program, which is ongoing in Mozambique, Zambia, Ghana, and India, has already documented the land rights of tens of thousands of farmers.

Documenting boundaries strengthens communities

Land documentation has proved transformative for Ácia and the community as a whole. Ácia and her neighbor Abílio, who likewise has her own land certificate, now can share a laugh when they see each other in the fields.

And the community has held ceremonies to mend relationships between other formerly feuding neighbors.

Documentation, said Mulakiwa, has planted seeds of trust in the community. And with that trust comes opportunities for cooperation. Today, the community association is discussing implementing community improvement projects, such as a mill, to which they can all commit their time and resources.

 

 

Land Ownership, Tumaco’s New Hope

Posted on by Amrit Bhandari

The pandemic has shown the Colombian government how structural land issues continue to hamper rural development.

Colombia’s hospitals have been challenged due to Covid-19, and while the government rushes to strengthen the country’s healthcare system, intensive care unit occupancy remains high throughout the pandemic.

The crisis has led many leaders to recognize that behind the draconian measures to curb infection, there are fundamental problems that undermine Colombia’s public service delivery and prosperity, such as issues with land administration and property formalization.

In the midst of a health crisis, the nation’s rural health centers are becoming more and more crucial as the virus reaches isolated areas. Thousands of families are a one or two-day trip from a hospital, so rural health clinics play a vital role in providing intermediate care as well as ambulance services to regional centers with specialized professionals. But many of these rural clinics, which belong to municipal governments, have never been formalized or indexed in Colombia’s national property registry.

In Tumaco, where Covid-19 made headlines early on in the pandemic, there are 80 rural health clinics. But 80% of Tumaco’s parcels are informal and unregistered, so Tumaco’s mayor, María Emilsen Angulo, who has been working hard to mobilize support for Tumaco’s hospitals, can do little for health clinics in rural areas that do not even have a registered land title. Next year, USAID and the Colombian government will begin massive formalization efforts in Tumaco.

“USAID has the funds that we don’t have. Plus, they already have the experience of rolling out a massive formalization and cadaster update pilot in Ovejas, Sucre, so here in Tumaco, we won’t have to improvise,” Angulo says. “USAID already knows the best way to do it.”

Working Together

The USAID-funded Land for Prosperity Activity is assisting Tumaco’s mayor to make land issues a priority over the next four years. With USAID support, the municipality’s Territorial Development Plan has earmarked funds to push land formalization to the forefront of public policy. Tumaco will also strengthen its Municipal Land Office and create a team of local experts who can begin looking at which parcels can be formalized in the name of the municipality without having to hire expensive professional services.

The lack of information about which parcels are formalized is just the tip of the iceberg. The majority of Colombia’s rural municipalities have never analyzed the situation to discover what properties—schools, clinics, parks, and utilities—are informal or why.

Banner Photo: SITUR Nariño

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We Hope that with Formalization the Context Will also Change

Posted on by Amrit Bhandari
The health crisis caused by the COVID-19 pandemic has shown that land formalization is vital to strengthen the role of health entities in rural Colombia. In Tumaco, 85% of the parcels are informally owned, illicit crops cover thousands of hectares, and the risk of antipersonnel landmines is high. Tumaco Mayor, María Emilsen Angulo, talks about the new USAID-supported land formalization campaign and how it could solve some of the problems that have hindered rural development for decades.

Is informality of public lands an obstacle to mobilizing resources that can be invested in infrastructure for public services, such as, health centers?

Understanding the importance of legalizing public properties and having the opportunity to benefit from public works funded by the regional government has been a step-by-step process for us. In fact, I’m honest with you, I am not sure if all the health centers are formalized, I do not have that information. But I know that, in the future, it will probably become an obstacle, since formalization is an essential requirement for implementing projects, especially at this critical moment when people’s health is a priority.

Have you been able to successfully care for COVID-19 patients?

Fortunately yes, and with the support of national, regional, and local entities, the situation in Tumaco has improved considerably. Daily positive cases have remained below 10. The curve has flattened substantially. First and second-level hospitals in Tumaco’s urban area have received funds. Luckily, these hospitals were built a long time ago, so the plot in which they are located is already legalized, which is certainly not the case for rural health centers. Tumaco is a vast territory, we have 368 veredas, in all of them there are communities in need of access to health services. We have almost 100 health centers, 80 of them in rural areas.

Eight out of 10 properties in Tumaco are informally owned, why isn’t there a culture of formalizing property in Tumaco?

Historically, the dynamics of the local economy have not urged people to see having formalized property as a priority issue for their livelihoods. Neither the farmer nor the fisherman has viewed their property as a tool to build their business or increase financial assets. We, as administrative authorities, have also failed to recognize the importance of formal property ownership. We have not had a vision of all the benefits this creates for rural development and for investing in social services.

What kind of challenges does the government face in formalizing land and serving the rural population?

We face multiple obstacles. Illegal groups have buried anti-personnel landmines in rural areas in an attempt to control the territory and protect their illicit crops. To be able to carry out the parcel sweeps, you must first deal with minefields. There are zones in Tumaco where people cannot enter due to the presence of these groups. So we will need permanent support and a strategic alliance with military authorities.

A crucial element of mass formalization is a social approach to mitigate conflicts and raise people’s awareness. We have to guarantee empowerment and permanent communication with citizens; council members; and leaders of community boards, veredas, and community councils. Coordination with them is fundamental, so that they can be prepared to help resolve this type of conflict.

We have to guarantee empowerment and permanent communication with citizens; council members; and leaders of community boards, veredas, and community councils. Coordination with them is fundamental, so that they can be prepared to help resolve this type of conflict.

How does the Land for Prosperity Activity aim to support the Mayor’s Office on formalization issues?

First of all, USAID has the resources that we do not. USAID programs also have the experience of having carried out the parcel sweeps and updated the cadaster in other municipalities, like Ovejas, Sucre. They already know the way, so we will not be improvising but building upon previous experiences. As for strengthening the Municipal Land Office, we could not even think of advancing land formalization without having a robust, capable office properly equipped with tools, facilities, and trained staff.

What other benefits does the Mayor’s Office in Tumaco gain from its relationship with USAID?

USAID has the advantage of having a close relationship with government entities, such as the National Land Agency and the Ministry of Defense. They have the experience and capacity to coordinate with all these entities to help us face a variety of situations, obstacles, and challenges in the field. USAID’s methodology is based on planning. We agree that without a Land Use Management Plan it is much harder to move forward but, thanks to USAID, Tumaco has already updated its plan.

Are the people of Tumaco willing to invest their time in this process?

I believe they are. But when we are ready to enter a vereda or a territory, we will need significant communication efforts because people no longer live there. We often see these challenges of visiting a vereda to find no one, just empty houses. People in Tumaco have a house or a farm in the rural area, but they do not live there, since they have left in search of better conditions for their children, or have simply been displaced by violence.

Banner Photo: SITUR Nariño

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Co-creation and Partnership Opportunity

Posted on by Amrit Bhandari

Partnership opportunity to address two Sustainable Landscapes challenges!

First, how do we speed and scale up profitable business models that secure sustainable, deforestation-free supply chains? Second, how do we develop and innovative strategies to scale landscape restoration and conservation? To support the co-creation of these models and strategies for Sustainable Landscapes, the Global Climate Change Office of USAID’s E3 Bureau (E3/GCC) posted to grants.gov and beta.sam.gov) a new partnership opportunity. Seeking collaborative and integrated solutions to the challenges of 1) reducing commodity-driven deforestation, and 2) scaling up landscape restoration, USAID encourages participation from both traditional and nontraditional, private sector actors.

Download the Full Announcement

Register for Climate Change Broad Agency Announcement (BAA) Industry Day Webinar 

Click here to register, and receive instructions on this live virtual session.

 

 

Building the Community from the Land

Posted on by Amrit Bhandari

USAID promotes land titling and land administration to help resolve the social conflicts facing the population of Caceres

The town of Caceres was already living in a sort of lockdown long before the coronavirus became an international health crisis. Just a year ago, a self-imposed curfew had curtailed business hours and streets were empty for most of the day and night. Territorial disputes, heedless violence, and constant threats have kept Caceres’ inhabitants always on the verge of abandoning their homes.

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Official figures claim there are 30,000 people living in this historic town, founded over 500 years ago on the banks of the Cauca river in Antioquia, but over the last two years, thousands of those people have left the municipality, unable to face another day of uncertainty. And although these conditions would be ideal for containing a highly contagious virus, they do little to promote rural development, reduce crime, and improve the quality of life.

In addition to being one of three municipalities prioritized by high-level dialog between the U.S. and Colombian governments, Caceres is also a PDET municipality within the Bajo Cauca region. Thus, it is the target of coordinated investments from donors and government entities.

In today’s Caceres, land administration is nearly nonexistent. Nearly 80% of the municipality’s 11,000 parcels are informally owned, and unregulated gold mining has become the municipality’s principal lure for crime syndicates. Also, illicit crops still cover about 1,100 hectares in the municipality. As threats continue to affect rural farmers, formal documentation of land ownership is more important than ever.

Emphasizing Land

In late 2019, the USAID-funded Land for Prosperity Activity began operating in the municipality and offering innovative actions that can increase land security, prevent displacement, and create an environment for sustainable rural development. The mayor of Caceres accepted the challenge and quickly mobilized a team to help create Caceres’ first Municipal Land Office (MLO). Here, a localized team of experts works directly with judges and the National Land Agency (ANT) to formalize public properties and urban properties. The MLO provides valuable information to citizens, promotes a culture of formal land transactions, and is essential in strengthening the coordination between national and rural leaders.

“Formalization is a way to stimulate the economy, generate a culture of peace and legality, and allow communities to put down roots,” Mayor Juan Carlos Rodriguez said. “Land formalization guarantees legal security and makes it easier for farmers to access credits, subsidies, and government programs to finance their agriculture projects.” Building on the Mayor’s motivation, in 2020, USAID facilitated a partnership aimed at increasing resources to formalize urban and rural plots and create incentives for illicit crop substitution. Through a memorandum of understanding, the ANT, Proantioquia, Antioquia’s regional government, the municipality, and USAID agreed to increase local and national coordination and enhance the private sector’s role in rural development. With a broad spectrum of partners, farmers who substitute coca for new crops like cocoa, rubber, or ranching, will have the opportunity to use land titles to access financial services and investment capital.

The memorandum will allow the government to test the concept of using land titles as an incentive for illicit crop substitution while strategic private public partnerships mobilize resources for new, licit economic opportunities. In addition, with USAID’s support, the ANT will work with the regional and municipal government leaders to formalize parcels where public entities operate, such as schools, health centers, and parks. Property titles for public lands allow local governments to pull down national-level resources to improve public services like education and health.

 

 

Ensuring Girls Inherit their Fair Share in Zambia

Posted on by Amrit Bhandari

Banner Photo: Female community members at Chiuye village in Nyamphande Chiefdom of Petauke District check over their parcels during the objections, corrections, and confirmation process. (Photo credit: Chika Banda/PDLA)

USAID-funded land documentation programs help secure daughters’ land inheritance rights and promote girls’ empowerment on the International Day of the Girl Child

When it comes to women’s land rights and gender norms, John Mwanza was no different from most men in many areas of rural Zambia. A local village leader, he believed that despite the bonds of marriage, his wife should not be granted ownership rights to his family’s land. John had also never considered that his daughter should be a beneficiary to the family’s land. He believed that one day she will marry a man who might end up taking the land from his family. Now, through the USAID-funded Integrated Land and Resource Governance (ILRG) program, Mr. Mwanza has had a change of heart and become a champion for ensuring that women, and particularly daughters, have rights to the land they live on.

CDLA Gender and Social Inclusion Officer Lucy Phiri (in white) looks over a community map with the Mwanza family. With USAID support, John Mwanza has registered his wife (in blue) as a person of interest and his eldest son (pictured) and his youngest son and daughter (not pictured) as landholders of the family land. Photo credit: Clement Robson Chirwa / ILRG 2020

Zambia has a dual land tenure system, with state land administered by the government and customary land administered by chiefs and other traditional leaders. Gender norms in both matrilineal and patrilineal societies hinder the land rights of women and their daughters. Family loyalties are defined by blood, and since wives are not directly related to the husband’s family, they are often excluded from land documentation. When women marry they are expected to move to their husband’s family land, so girls are also precluded from land inheritance. In most cases, only a man’s relatives and male descendants are allowed to inherit family land.

“Land is the bottleneck and the barrier that we could never get past. Everyone wants more, so they take advantage of the widows and make claims. Prior to CDLA’s arrival, each week, dozens of households lined up seeking resolution to conflicts over field boundaries. Now there is peace in the chiefdom.” Chieftainess Mkanda, Chipata District, Zambia.

Conversations about deep-seated gender biases are part of the USAID program’s efforts to increase land tenure security in Zambia and the wider strategy to challenge harmful gender norms that prevent women from owning and fully benefiting from land and natural resources. The ILRG program is working with local civil society organizations, such as the Chipata District Land Alliance (CDLA) and Petauke District Land Alliance (PDLA), to advance women’s social and economic empowerment through land rights in Zambia’s Eastern Province.

Customary land documentation helps low income farmers protect their land and provides security in the event of ownership conflicts, which is common among neighbors, relatives, and outside investors. For women, secure land rights offer opportunities to access financial services and higher social standing, and shift household and community-level decision-making dynamics on how resources are spent and distributed. Secure land rights are thus an important pathway for women’s economic empowerment.

Through ILRG, USAID is pioneering customary land documentation by employing socially inclusive GPS and smartphone technology known as MAST, or Mobile Approaches to Secure Tenure. The approach integrates gender in land documentation to ensure women’s interests in land are registered, even in male-dominated systems. The approach also promotes the rights of all of their children and encourages women’s leadership in local land governance. The MAST land documentation process asks chiefs, village leaders, and landowners to participate in social gatherings and community dialogue sessions that break down gender stereotypes and reinforce the idea that equal land rights benefit the family and the community.

Photo: Sandra Coburn / Cloudburst

“It’s our job to remind the community that by registering their wives and daughters as persons of interest or landowners, it makes sense from the family’s perspective to secure and protect their land,” says Adam Ngoma, CDLA coordinator.

In John Mwanza’s village, the CDLA staff explain how excluding girls from family land will have serious implications on their future, limiting their livelihood opportunities and increasing their vulnerability to gender-based violence.

The participatory sessions helped men like John Mwanza, the village leader who would previously never have considered allowing his daughter to inherit his land, to appreciate gender equality and to request CDLA to list his wife as a person of interest – which protects her rights to occupy and use the land – and his daughter as a landholder. Now, his daughter will grow up secure land rights, which she can use for economic opportunities in the future.

A Daughter’s Tale
“We are in a modern era so no need to deprive women and girls of what they deserve. Registering my wife as a landholder has helped cement my marriage and the love between my wife and I.” Weka Ziwa, Nzamane, Chipata District, Zambia. Registered all six of his children during customary land documentation 
Zambia, Chipata: Chieftainess Mkanda at her palace. Across much of Zambia, Customary systems prevail and they do not necessarily align with the formal legal system. While some customary tenure systems limit the rights of women and vulnerable groups, they provide an important form of local governance. A USAID project to strengthen governance in both the formal and customary systems and promote sustainable stewardship of natural resources, worked with the Chieftainess and other leaders to map and document land rights within their chiefdoms. Photo credit: Sandra Coburn

In another corner of the Mkanda Chiefdom, 41-year-old Charity Mbewe has worked hard to become the village headperson and lead her community. When her father recently died, the family farm went to her brothers, because according to local gender norms daughters do not inherit land. Although Charity has four children, she never paused to think that her children could have benefitted from her deceased father’s land.

When CDLA began land documentation in her village, she worried that her female children might face a similar fate: powerless to inherit land or worse, one day become a landless widow.

Thanks to USAID’s efforts to integrate gender into customary land documentation, Charity Mbewe, worked with her siblings to include her daughters’ names as landholders of her father’s farm. Charity’s oldest daughter is married but has no land, proving that marriage does not guarantee that women can access land. In fact, her inclusion in the title of her grandfather’s farm will be the first time she will be a landholder. 

 

 

Announcing New Mission Support Activity for Integrated Environmental Programming

Posted on by Amrit Bhandari

E3’s Offices of Land and Urban (E3/LU), Forestry and Biodiversity (E3/FAB), and Global Climate Change (E3/GCC) are pleased to announce a new jointly managed global integrated resource management activity that provides cross-cutting programming support to Missions.

The Integrated Natural Resource Management (INRM) activity provides on-demand support services and technical assistance for USAID Missions, Bureaus and Independent Offices across a wide array of environmental and natural resource management issues.  INRM covers the full range of environmental issues USAID works on and is managed jointly by the USAID E3 Offices of Land and Urban, Forestry and Biodiversity, and Global Climate Change.  The activity is designed to help Operating Units achieve higher impact environment programming and to support the uptake of principles and approaches outlined in the Agency’s Environmental and Natural Resource Management (ENRM) Framework.

The Integrated Natural Resource Management activity will support Missions with integrated programming across the program cycle and across sectors, such as food security and biodiversity, health and climate change, land use and environmental protection.  INRM’s overarching cross-cutting principles consider climate risks and the inclusion of women, girls, and other marginalized populations.  Technical services include:

  • Strategic planning based on timely analysis and best available evidence;
  • Project and activity design and adaptive management;
  • Testing and learning from new approaches for integrated environmental programming;
  • Monitoring, evaluation, and learning of multi-sectoral programs; and
  • Communications and knowledge management.

For more information about how to access INRM’s technical services, please download an info sheet about the new Mission-support mechanism here:  INRM Factsheet.