Document Type: Briefs

Luz Esmeralda García, a 53-year-old mother of two, lived a stable life in Tame, where she and her partner raised livestock on a farm, owned a small business, and had a lovely home. Life on their land was quiet until the war came. “When the guerrillas came, they told us to arm ourselves and join their ranks, or leave,” she recalls. After this threat, they moved to Villavicencio, where other struggling displaced families had gone. In discussion with other displaced women in her community, Luz discovered that few knew about their rights or options. She became the leader of the Network of Displaced Women in Meta and realized that to move forward with their lives, the women in her community—many of them widows—needed land.

Luz heard about an INCODER program that distributed land to displaced families, but the application process was technical, competitive, and overwhelming. She hired a previous winner to help her write her application, and won.

INCODER provided the land, but no technical assistance or other agricultural support. The women arrived on the land, divided it into 21 plots, formed a women’s agricultural association called Agroempo, and settled there with nothing but a dream for their future. Knowing they needed more support, Luz contacted local authorities, who connected her with USAID’s Land and Rural Development Program (LRDP), which supports rural families with packages of interventions that improve land access, connect families with agricultural projects, and increase rural development.

LRDP worked with the women and municipality to ensure the women could access and benefit from PARES funding—a mechanism that brings national-level funds into rural areas. By mobilizing resources this way, LRDP helped the women’s association access seeds, fertilizer, and other agricultural inputs. LRDP also gave them technical assistance to help them use their land in the best way possible. Further, the program connected the women’s association with local authorities to ensure they had a voice in the creation of rural development plans, and helped the municipality undertake a road study. When the road is built in the future, the women will have greater access and connectivity to buyers and markets.

October 2017—As a young mother of three, Prisca Lutego wanted nothing but the best for her family. She dreamed of the day when she could expand her small shop to bring in more income, in turn opening new windows of opportunity for her children. But without the hard cash to turn this dream into a reality – and limited access to credit and banking services – Lutego had few options.

Fortunately, perfect solutions sometimes present themselves in unexpected ways. It all began when Lutego’s central Tanzanian village of Kiponzelo became part of a growing movement to do away with traditional, undocumented systems of land ownership in favor of a formal, government-sanctioned process. This meant clearly documented land claims for villagers, accurately mapped property lines using GPS, better property values, and equal land rights for men and women. And for Lutego, it meant having the security to use her land as collateral.

When Lutego first obtained a certificate of customary right of occupancy (CCRO)—the Tanzanian equivalent of a land deed—she did not realize that a simple document, combined with her newfound understanding of land rights, would open doors she once thought closed to her.

“My husband and I wanted to do more for our family,” she recalled. “I didn’t understand that land is powerful and that I could also have land access—I thought only husbands and fathers could.”

After attending training on women’s land rights under the Feed the Future Tanzania Land Tenure Assistance activity, Lutego soon learned that her ability to own land was entrenched in the constitution and well defined in land-specific legislation. Likewise, her husband Lemmy deepened his understanding of land tenure through informational meetings at the village assembly and hamlet level, laying the groundwork for a better future for their family. Drawing on their newfound knowledge, the couple opted for a joint tenancy CCRO, giving them both an equal right to occupy the land and inherit the property should one of them pass away.

With renewed confidence in their land rights, Lutego and her husband used their CCRO as collateral at Access Bank, successfully qualifying for a TZS 3 million ($1,300) loan. Today, they are quickly on their way to expanding the family business—all thanks to the power of formal land ownership. “We had some awareness before, but not like this,” said Lutego. “My husband sees me as a partner and I feel secure with my rights…I’ll never forget the days I signed a CCRO, and later used it as collateral.”

The Land Tenure Assistance activity is a USAID-implemented effort under Feed the Future, the U.S. Government’s global hunger and food security initiative. By registering an estimated 50,000 plots of land by 2019, the program works to reduce risks related to land tenure and pave the way for future agricultural investment in Tanzania’s rural heartland.

While Tanzania’s legal framework provides clear land tenure protections for men and women alike, village-level land tenure is frequently not secure and is often susceptible to outside interests. The land in many villages is typically not mapped, demarcated according to use, or registered—and there is significant disparity in how investors access land in Tanzania. Each of these factors combine to represent a significant and binding constraint to economic growth and investment, provide a climate for disputes, and disenfranchise vulnerable groups.

To mitigate these issues, Feed the Future Tanzania Land Tenure Assistance (LTA) seeks to clarify and document land ownership, increase local understanding of land use and land rights, and support land use planning by virtue of five main efforts:

1. Assist villages and district administrations in completing the land use planning process;
2. Assist villages and district administrations to map parcels and deliver certificates of customary rights of occupancy (CCROs) in selected villages;
3. Educate and build capacity of village land governance institutions;
4. Educate and build capacity for district-level land governance; and
5. Assist the Ministry of Lands, Housing and Human Settlement Development and other Government of Tanzania institutions to develop and apply systems, tools, and regulations that support low-cost first registration of land and the subsequent transactions of registered lands on a national scale.

Local sustainability is a critical component of the LTA activity. The goal of this activity is to empower district and village land institutions in the areas targeted by LTA to carry forward the capacity-building and land administration process independently, with little or no outside financial support once LTA concludes. This goal highlights the importance of proving cost-effective approaches for land registration.

Expected Results

• Easily replicable processes, protocols, and procedures for village-level intervention that result in first registration of land with minimal disruption among beneficiaries.
• Easily replicable processes, protocols, and procedures for village-level intervention that result in first registration of land with minimal disruption among beneficiaries.
• Simplified regulations and administrative procedures for registering and transacting land.
• Cost of parcel registration decreased by 70 percent, with the end cost to claimant of around $10/parcel.
• An estimated 50,000 CCROs registered among more than 14,000 claimants across 41 beneficiary villages.
• Village land certificates and village land use plans registered for assisted villages emphasizing sound evidence of participation by marginalized groups.
• Villager and village authority-level trainings delivered in at least 41 villages on the Village Land Act No. 5, the CCRO process, women’s land rights, and agriculture-related business skills.
• District-level trainings delivered for local government authorities, including trainings on land administration and land use planning processes, land dispute resolution, record keeping, and land valuation skills.
• Iringa District Land Office improved and equipped to store both physical and digital village land records.
• Awareness and use of innovative digital land registry tools increased among a broad spectrum of stakeholders in Tanzania.

Innovation can be sophisticated and flashy, like a new interactive app for diamond valuation or a portable mechanized washplant that extracts diamonds more efficiently. USAID-funded Property Rights and Artisanal Diamond Development (PRADD II) is currently rolling out both of these innovations in Côte d’Ivoire. However, the project is also finding that getting to the basics of how to dig a better hole, and how to fill them in, may be even more transformational.

“Let’s talk about the humble auger,” said PRADD II director Mark Freudenberger this August at a USAID brown bag on innovative technologies. The hand-held auger, brought to Côte d’Ivoire by the U.S. Geological Survey for testing a simplified method of generating deposit models from bore hole data, makes small bore holes down to 15 feet and requires only two people. As part of a training on improved mining techniques conducted in February by a PRADD II specialist from the Central African Republic (CAR), augers were introduced as a way to determine how deep and how wide diamond-bearing gravel layers are located.

“The auger saves us weeks and sometimes months of work,” said Adama Dosso, a cooperative technician trained by PRADD II from the village of Massala Assolo. Before, teams of miners would have to dig a deep pit to test a site, or just take their chance on mining out a full pit, which costs time and money and may yield poor results. In addition, when these sites are not filled back in, such methods prove to be detrimental to the environment and unsafe for the surrounding communities. Indeed, earlier this year, a child fell in an abandoned pit and died.

Using the auger to determine the depth and direction of gravel provides a more informed approach to site selection. Diggers can also apply the improved mining technique of “terracing”: diggers backfill pits as they systematically remove the diamond-bearing gravel. In Côte d’Ivoire, where mining has gone on for decades leaving behind dangerous holes and destroyed land, using the augers and the terracing sytem could have an enormous positive impact.

“The miners were surprised when they saw how much gravel came from what they thought was a depleted site,” said Sylvain Kouassi, a government agent who provides technical assistance to miners. The reason is that traditional mining consists of haphazard holes over a broad area, with lots of unrecovered gravel between the holes. The terracing techniques applied to old sites allow the villagers to recover remaining gravel while also restoring the land for agriculture and removing dangerous holes.

Since being trained, 30 cooperatives completed demonstration sites in each of their villages, and are planning campaigns to convince and even require diggers—most of whom are migrant workers—use the new techniques of using augers and backfilling pits. What is particularly surprising, however, is that the cooperatives see the techniques as an opportunity to get a better price and change the way they benefit from mining. “In Côte d’Ivoire, communities have historically not mined themselves, but have instead taxed outside diggers,” explained Terah DeJong, PRADD II Côte d’Ivoire Country Director. “They are called cooperatives, but they have rarely invested in mining itself.” The reason is that the haphazard and poor techniques make it an extremely risky activity. Diggers have financial backers who take on the risks and costs, but this also means the backers pass along that cost to diggers in the form of poor prices.

From surveys and statistical analyses, PRADD II estimates that a typical digger earns less than 15% of the initial sales price and less than 5% of the export value. Nearly all diggers are financed by buyers, and they are obligated to sell to them. Villagers have historically preferred to tax instead, as this is more stable. “We are now waking up,” said Adama Dosso, the cooperative focal point. Convinced that the new techniques decrease the risk, many are now starting to mine and dig themselves.

Thanks to the PRADD II training and some equipment support to the cooperatives, the augers have opened the possibility of self-financing by the cooperatives and thereby getting the full sales price of the stones without the 150% to 1000% markup by the buyers. As such, the humble auger and the simple terracing techniques could have a transformational impact on mining and miners, increasing earnings and also rehabilitating the earth.

“It’s not all about apps and tablets,” reminded Mark Freudenberger. “Sometimes simple improvements are the most innovative and have the most impact.”

In Liberia, there have been a number of reforms in the land sector, dating back to 2009 with the establishment of the Land Commission. There has been a lot of work done in the sector, so far, including the formulation to the Land Rights Policy, Criminal Conveyance of Land Law, and the establishment of the Liberia Land Authority.

Information on the happenings in the land sector was held by with a privileged few, as the vast majority of the citizens have little and in some places, no knowledge of land and property rights issues.

As such, there continues to be fights for land amongst families, communities, and even counties.

In 2016, the Land Governance Support Activity (LGSA) and the Interim Land Task Force started working with local journalists to equip them with knowledge and skills in reporting on the land sector and encouraged journalists to more frequently report on land issues.

Since then, there have been significant improvements in the quality and frequency of coverage on the land sector. As a result, LGSA has increased its efforts to appreciate journalists and motivate them to do more by collaborating with the Press Union of Liberia (PUL) in 2017 to introduce a new category of award at the annual PUL awards to honor the Best Land Reporter.

Gbatemah Senah of the Bush Chicken, an online news wire, won the award; as a result, he feels proud of himself and his work as a journalist.

“I believe that land rights should concern every citizen because it is tied to the maintenance and promotion of peace and development, and I acknowledge that my contribution as a journalist will promote this. I will continue to work with my institution to increase coverage on land issues from a development and citizens’ driven perspectives, focusing on land rights, usage, and governance.” Said Mr. Senah.

During his presentation at LGSA and the LLA’s regional media training, where Senah was a participant and guest presenter, he thanked LGSA for the award, which he says has motivated and encouraged him to go further beyond his previous works and efforts in reporting on the sector.

He also admonished fellow journalists to be diligent in developing their news stories.

“Don’t be in rush. Spend time on your stories. Go the extra mile if you have to. Do your research. In that way, you could bring out your best, and it will be rewarded by the society and people you work for. Mediocrity will not help.” – Mr. Senah noted.

Land continues to be a big issue in many parts of Montserrado County, particularly in the Johnsonville area. There have been numerous cases of people wrongly occupying land, fighting over land ownership, and double sales of land and encroachments. These disputes in many instances have led to major injuries and in some cases, the loss of lives.

The Township Commissioner of Johnsonville, Hon. Melvin Bettie expressed frustration in how much of his professional time is occupied by mitigating land cases. According to Hon. Bettie, “Over sixty percent of our time in this office is devoted to land cases that come here. Every day people are fighting for land when they shouldn’t be. We have been trying hard to see how we can put systems in place to just end all the noise over land because it is painting our township in a truly ugly way.’

In response to many of the issues that Johnsonville continues to suffer over land, in early August 2017, the Liberia Land Authority (LLA) and its partner, USAID’s Land Governance Support Activity (LGSA), hosted a one-day Land Conference in Johnsonville. The event brought over 135 land stakeholders in the township of Johnsonville, including local government officials, land administrators, landowners and dealers, women and youth representatives, community leaders, and residents as well as the media.

Commissioner Bettie expressed his joy during the conference. “This gathering alone is a great success, and I am very happy and thankful to the LLA and LGSA for prioritizing my township, Johnsonville. To even get all the stakeholders together has been a major challenge for me as someone will always not be available when the others are ready. But today, you have succeeded and that makes me happy.” Commissioner Bettie. Hon. Bettie feels the conference was timely and very important, especially in these times, where there are so many disputes relating to land in the township, and it keeps mounting pressure on the township authority.

Hon. Bettie feels the conference was timely and very important, especially in these times, where there are so many disputes relating to land in the township, and it keeps mounting pressure on the township authority.

He praised the high level of involvement and participation on all the community’s leaders, whom he said are the first point of call when there are issues in the communities.

Participants recommended several actions after the group discussions. Some of the recommendations included setting up a community land task force and opening and land deed registry at the Commissioner’s Office.

The Commissioner said he is excited to work with all the local leaders in Johnsonville Township to ensure that these recommendations are met if they will solve the land issues the township is facing.

The Liberia Land Authority (LLA) and the Land Governance Support Activity (LGSA) completed an incredible two-month awareness campaign throughout Liberia on the Land Rights Bill and the Act Against the Criminal Conveyance of Land. Liberians throughout the country yearn for secure land rights. They want equal and secure access to land that allows them to be

Liberians throughout the country yearn for secure land rights. They want equal and secure access to land that allows them to be landowners, not just users. Citizens also want harmonized boundaries, which will reduce disputes and fighting over land occurring among families, friends, and neighbors.

However, all over the country, there is very low awareness and knowledge on land issues, so it was no surprise that local residents praised and appreciated the awareness campaign held by LGSA and LLA.

“We have learned so many things on land today, and we want to assure you that our new knowledge [on criminal conveyance] will be implemented accordingly. It is better to avoid going to court because it is expensive and time consuming. We can handle our land cases in the community through mediation,” said Hon. Stephen A. Gwee, Mayor of Totota.

The Mayor of Totota is optimistic that, through LGSA and the LLA’s campaign, he has learned enough to improve how he deals with land cases in his city, and he is calling on local leaders in all the counties to prioritize managing land issues to prevent conflicts.

He added that with the knowledge provided on the double sale of land, it’s about time that Liberians confront the problems directly and quickly.

“Most of us leaders know the real problems when it comes to land business, but we can be acting like we don’t know or are hiding from it. We even know the main people that are causing the problems but for some reason, we can be afraid to confront them. Let’s face the problems and deal with it. Simple!” – Hon. Gwee

He further noted that if leaders are sincere to themselves and the people they serve, forgetting about family ties and selfish personal interests, the development of Liberia will go a long way and people will no longer fight over land.

“This is what I am committed to. And with this renewed committed, this city will be a better place. Thanks to the Land Authority and USAID.” – Hon. Gwee

For the last seventeen years, residents of Chengue have found few reasons to dance. They fled their small village in the heart of the tropical hill country of northern Colombia after living through a bloody massacre perpetrated by a group of paramilitaries in 2001. That day, 60 uniformed killers ended the lives of 27 villagers with hammers, rocks, and machetes, and burned down dozens of houses. They told the survivors to never return, because from that point forward “Chengue would be gone forever.”

This year, hundreds of Chengueros proved their attackers wrong and organized the first fiestas patronales in more than 20 years. On the same plaza where their fathers, brothers, uncles, and cousins were killed, residents danced to the local rhythms of porro and gaita music. The historic festivities—held in the first week of July—were colorful scenes of people dancing, women stirring pots of sancocho (turkey soup), poker-faced elders playing cards and drinking beer, excited children flipping marbles on the roads, and agile horseback riders on display.

The fiesta was the latest attempt by Chengue families to show one another that their former lives are not gone—rather, those two-day bacchanals that once made Chengue famous are back with the same pomp and pageantry of days past.

Chengue is located in the region known as Montes de María, where, following the demobilization of Colombia’s brutal paramilitary groups in 2008, the government began the slow process of land restitution and reparations for victims. A decade after the massacre, the government created the Land Restitution Unit (LRU), which has set out to recognize the land rights of victims, provide reparations, and allow victims to return to their homes and their lives. More than 10,000 people who survived the violence and were forced to leave their homes have since processed land restitution claims with the LRU.

By the time the LRU was created, the more than 300 Chengueros had nearly lost all hope for any justice related to the massacre, a tragedy that, in their eyes, seemed tethered to a corrupt and bureaucratic system. In 2006, a local judge determined that the police and the Colombian armed forces did not do their job to prevent the attack, awarding a settlement of more than US$1 million. Eventually, approximately 100 surviving families were paid around US$10,000 each, a paltry sum compared to the amount the court originally awarded. Then In 2008, the man who had ordered the massacre, Juancho Dique, was sentenced to just eight years in prison as part of the government’s paramilitary demobilization program; He was released in 2015.

Path to Restitution 

In 2012, the LRU started a land restitution case for 37 families from Chengue, but due to complicated land issues related to informal ownership and most of the land belonging to the state, the case hit a dead end and languished while hundreds more restitution cases were piled onto the understaffed agency.

“Chengue was a very complicated case, and for us to properly recognize the land rights of the victims, we first had to clear up issues with land use and ownership,” explains LRU social worker and case manager Elina Rivera. “Without establishing a route to bring this case to fruition, these victims would likely lose the chance to be able to pass their land on to the next generation or have the option to sell. In some cases, that link to their land might be lost forever.”

In 2014, USAID began working with the LRU in Montes de María to identify bottlenecks in the restitution process. To this end, USAID facilitated a “case clinic”—a multi-institutional platform including national agencies related to land administration, local government partners, and restitution judges—to work out the barriers that were holding up cases like Chengue.

“The case clinic methodology gave us the tools to get through a larger number of cases. By removing bottlenecks, we can provide better responses to the families who are expecting answers,” explains the LRU’s regional director in Montes de María, Álvaro Tapia Castelli.

In April 2016, a judge ruled in favor of 37 Chengue families, recognizing their land rights to more than 72 hectares of land as well as ordering government entities to undertake comprehensive reparations such as new houses, a paved road, and investments in agriculture. The sentence was yet another step in delivering justice to Chengue’s survivors and setting them on the path back to their village.

Immediately after the ruling, USAID facilitated the work of a post-ruling monitoring group that includes the Chengue Victims Association, local government leaders, the LRU, and relevant land agencies. Each month, the group follows up on progress in compliance with the judge’s orders.

In June 2017, the National Land Agency began delivering on its duty to formalize the parcels of land included in the sentence. The agency issued property titles for 27 lots, mostly located around the main road and the village square.

“We have been waiting a long time, and it’s clear that we will need the help of partners to get things done. Now we hope the momentum will continue and we will see our houses rebuilt,” says Jairo Barreto López, the main organizer of the festivities. “We didn’t organize this party for the sake of throwing a party. We did it to show everybody that Chengue did not die. Chengue is still alive.”

Ensuring Legitimate Diamond Exports through Miner Identification

Since the liberalization of the mining sector in 1961, the Government of the Central African Republic (CAR) has faced challenges in ensuring traceability of its diamond exports. One such challenge is establishing an accurate database to identify individual miners as a source point for Central African diamonds entering the global diamond trade – a vital step towards certification per the Kimberley Process Operational Framework. This assures that no foreign nationals work the diamond mining sites. With support from the Property Rights and Artisanal Diamond Development Project (PRADD II), the Permanent Secretariat of the Kimberley Process (PSKP) is assisting the CAR Government to restore a conflict-free and legal diamond value chain by taking steps towards setting up a stringent process to identify miners working in CAR’s compliant zones.

In the past, the Minister of Mines, Energy and Hydraulics issued ID cards without a miner’s photo. Multiple miners sometimes used the same card at different mining sites. With this situation, diamonds cannot be traced back to a legitimate source and thus ensure that revenues from purchases do not flow to rebel groups perpetuating conflict and instability. With support from PRADD II, the ministry introduced small mobile units for producing photo ID cards for miners in the compliant zones of Berberati, Carnot, Gadzi, Nola and Boda. The kit consists of a digital camera, a portable rechargeable printer and printing materials. Training was provided to the provincial mining administration who travel to mining sites to register miners.

Within two months of launching the mining kits, the Prefectural Mining Service issued photo ID’s to 65 diamond pit owners and almost 300 workers. The cost to miners is less than five US Dollars – an affordable price that enables the ministry to maintain stocks of paper and ink and ensures the miners are legally registered. “The fact that the mining representatives are…coming to us helps to solve this problem which often arises among artisans in provinces that cannot access the studios that issue the cards,” said Thierry Ngodi, a miner at a site located 25 km outside of Boda. As for the PSKP Secretary, he welcomes this new reform that “facilitates the creation of a database and monitoring of artisanal miners,” leading to greater exports entering the conflict-free market.