Author: Amrit Bhandari

Originally appeared in Exposure.

DURING THE AGRARIAN REFORM OF THE 1990S, THE NOW-DEFUNCT INCORA AWARDED COLLECTIVE LAND TITLES TO GROUPS OF CITIZENS IN THE MUNICIPALITY OF FUENTEDEORO, LOCATED IN META IN CENTRAL COLOMBIA. TODAY, MANY OF THESE LAND OWNERS FEEL POWERLESS AND ARE UNWILLING TO MAKE PROPER INVESTMENTS IN THEIR LAND. IN THIS INTERVIEW, ANTONIO LONDOÑO, THE MAYOR OF FUENTEDEORO, DISCUSSES THE MUNICIPALITY’S NEW LAND OFFICE AND ITS JOINT WORK WITH USAID, WHICH SEEKS TO “INDIVIDUALIZE” THESE COLLECTIVELY HELD LANDS, STRENGTHEN CITIZENS’ LAND RIGHTS, AND FOSTER GREATER OPPORTUNITIES FOR RURAL COMMUNITIES.

Q: Were Fuentedeoro residents displaced during the conflict?

A: Yes. Fuentedeoro has more than 1,800 displaced people. The municipality was the object of various guerrilla incursions. In 1997, guerrillas planted a bomb that destroyed four blocks in the urban area. They destroyed the police station in Puerto Limón and assassinated more than five police officers. The guerrilla wreaked a lot of damage, and we were forced to go elsewhere. I was kidnapped twice by guerrillas.

Q: Many years ago, the now-defunct INCORA awarded collectively owned territories to residents in Fuentedeoro. Why wasn’t that effort successful?

A: INCORA practically forced these people to become members of community businesses, but it didn’t provide support for productive projects. It didn’t offer orientation or training. It left people to their fate, and each person ended up going their own way.

Q: What other problems does this model present?

A: Let’s say you have a parcel with 15 users. If one of these users doesn’t pay taxes, everyone is affected when it comes to requesting a loan. The bank will ask for a certificate of good standing, and no one will be able to get it. And, for example, if one of the users doesn’t pay back a loan, the entire parcel is embargoed, and everyone has to pay for that person. That is serious. These are examples of things that have happened to us many times.

Q: How is the municipality planning to resolve this situation?

A: USAID is helping us formalize these parcels at an individual level. We have seven parcels covering about 1,100 hectares, where about 150 families live and which are important for agriculture. With USAID, we’re helping the community formalize their lands and become true owners of this land. This helps them with many things: to be able to take out a loan, to mortgage, to make development and economic plans. Without a land title, they don’t have anything, just the possession of their lands, which makes it hard for them to improve if they lack the resources.

 

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Originally appeared on Exposure.

ON A MISSION TO FORMALIZE PRIVATE PROPERTY AND STRENGTHEN LAND TENURE SECURITY IN CONFLICT-AFFECTED AREAS IN COLOMBIA, THE NATIONAL LAND AGENCY AND USAID PARTNER TO DELIVER INTEGRATED RURAL DEVELOPMENT AND LAND GOVERNANCE SOLUTIONS.

When Derly Jomar and her husband bought 1.5 hectares from her father-in-law in the village of Calarma, they made the uncommon decision to travel to a notary two hours down the mountain in Chaparral–located in Southern Tolima–to make the purchase official. Most people in this isolated corner of Central Colombia tend to make business deals with a firm handshake, a person’s word, and perhaps a scribbled contract on a spare piece of paper. Five out of every ten land parcels in Calarma are informally owned.

This decision to notarize their purchase agreement, although laudable, still represented just part of the formalization process. Completing the process requires additional steps before government land-entities. However, as Derly explains, “We couldn’t afford to completely formalize our property with the nation because it’s very expensive. But we needed proof of purchase in case my father-in-law dies. We don’t know if all of his children are going to respect our purchase.”

Once the papers were notarized, Derly and her husband embarked on their plan. They used the notarized papers to take out small loans from the bank, building equity and credit. In 2015, she took out a loan for US$2,400 (6 million pesos) to buy an oven and set up the first official bakery in her village.

Jomar’s story is now an example for her neighbors, small-scale coffee farmers, of what can be achieved when property moves along the spectrum from informal to formal ownership.

TO FORMALIZE OR NOT TO FORMALIZE?

The Colombian Institute for Rural Development, USAID and the newly-created National Land Agency have been working to secure land rights in this coffee-producing district since 2014. USAID, through its rural development programs, first went to Calarma to introduce the idea of formalization to campesinos who never had considered it a priority or had the opportunity to learn about it.

“It was difficult because very few people knew anything about formalization, and there was little interest,” says Juan Carlos Padilla, a land formalization expert from the National Land Agency. “But that is the advantage of doing it this way—the contact with the users. It’s more than land governance, it is social work.

The government has had little presence in this mountainous area of the country ever since the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia, or FARC, emerged in Southern Tolima in the mid-sixties. Some say these leftist rebels brought order to what was an otherwise chaotic time in Colombia’s rural areas, where families and neighbors were pitted against each other by virtue of political preference. But FARC control also meant that government services and investments were kept out of the region for decades.

 

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Originally appeared on the Thomson Reuters Foundation website.

Kosovo is to revolutionize its land laws and will, for the first time, clearly define formal ownership and encourage women to inherit and own land in their own right.

Deputy Prime Minister Hajredin Kuci said on Friday that the government wanted to modernize its property system to “bring Kosovo society fully into the Western world” and foster greater equality and prosperity in the Balkan country […] Women in particular had been unfairly excluded from property ownership because of traditional patrilineal values, added Kuci, a former justice minister.

He said only 18 percent of women owned property and cited research by the U.S. government’s development agency USAID showing just 3.8 percent inherited property […] “It is our duty to explain to our citizens the benefits that equal exercise of property rights brings to our own families,” he said.

“When a woman owns property, for example, she can use that property as collateral for a loan to develop her business, allowing her to become self-reliant and independent. When girls are independent, they are more likely to resist domestic violence. This is good for everyone.”

A public campaign to encourage citizens to change their attitudes to women’s property rights and to formalize ownership is already under way with USAID support.

Read the full article on the Thomson Reuters Foundation website.

Originally appeared in Exposure.

Deyis Carmona Tejeda is not an actress. She acted for the first time when she was 43, inspired by displaced women who also suffered the ravages of war.

Behind the microphones, she had to let go of her own story for a moment in order to get into Somebody Else’s Body—as the play is called—and give life to Juana, the protagonist of a real-life story that recounts how she was displaced from her land by violent groups, how her son disappeared and was murdered, and how she lived under constant threat in addition to suffering abuse by her husband.

The play is one of the 12 radio dramas from the series Land Rights: Stories Made by Women for Women, directed by Colombian actor Daniel Rocha. The radio dramas are meant to disseminate information about land-related services available to women and victims of the conflict. The strategy is part of a United States Agency for International Development (USAID) program that has been working with the Colombian government since 2014, especially with the entities involved with land administration, like the Superintendence of Notary and Registry, the National Land Agency, and the Land Restitution Unit.

ON THE RADIO

Through female voices, these radio dramas guide other women in Colombia on how to formalize their property, file land restitution claims, and acquire funding and technical assistance for agricultural projects.

More than 70 women—including farmers, Afro-descendants, and members of indigenous communities—from 18 municipalities in Cesar, Sucre, Bolívar, Cauca, Meta, and Tolima were part of creating the scripts and storylines. The stories have been broadcast on 36 radio stations in these departments.

“We received training from USAID to strengthen our skills. We think this is important because land institutions are also being strengthened through this program, and the program scored a goal by working with both of us,” noted Deyis.

Many of the women who participated in the radio series have been or are currently involved in the land restitution process. Since their release, the radio dramas have reached more than six million listeners in 96 municipalities. In addition to airing on radio stations, the dramas have been disseminated via CD.

Listen to a radio drama here: https://soundcloud.com/usaidlrdp

 

A lot has happened with #landmatters over the past year. Let’s take a look at USAID’s top 10 land matters stories!

• Mobile Mapping Expands Across Africa

“Mobile Mapping Expands Across Africa” follows USAID’s Mobile Applications to Secure Tenure (MAST) program as it expands from Tanzania and Zambia to Burkina Faso, making the process of mapping land rights simpler and less expensive.

View the photo essay and learn more »

• African Union Pledges 30% of Land Will Now Be Allocated to Women

Earlier this year, the African Union made a groundbreaking pledge: by 2025, thirty percent of land in Africa will be allocated to women—and documented in their names. Why does this matter? Read this article by Susan Markham, Senior Coordinator for Gender Equality and Women’s Empowerment at USAID.

View the full story and learn more »

• USAID Goes Myth-Busters on Impact Evaluations

Are impact evaluations too difficult and expensive? Do they take years to show results? Here are some of the common misconceptions about impact evaluations and some lessons learned from a USAID funded impact evaluation in Zambia.

View the full story and learn more »

• Looking Back on a Decade of Feeding Ethiopia’s Future

“Feeding Ethiopia’s Future: Lessons from a Decade of Land Certification” looks back on the measurable impact made by USAID’s land certification programs in Ethiopia, including a 44 percent increase in the likelihood of a wife deciding which crops to grow on land under her control, an 11 percent increase in the likelihood of a woman possessing land in her own name, and a 10 percent increase in the likelihood of a household taking out any credit for farming.

View the photo essay and learn more »

• Glimmers of Hope in Côte d’Ivoire Two and a Half Years After the Diamond Ban Lift

In the time since the UN lifted its embargo in 2014, Côte d’Ivoire has been rebuilding its diamond industry to re-enter the legal diamond trade. USAID has been partnering with the European Union on a project that is working with the local diamond industry to strengthen property rights and governance and improve the livelihoods of artisanal mining communities.

View the full story and learn more »

• Improving Pastoral Land Management in Kenya & Namibia

“Empowering Pastoralists: How mobile technology is protecting land and connecting communities” provides a look at the work that USAID and the US Department of Agriculture are doing in Kenya and Namibia through the Land Potential Knowledge System (LandPKS) project.

View the photo essay and learn more »

• Policies Created from the Ground Up

USAID is on the ground in Burma, supporting rural families, communities, and the government to create the fundamental policies needed to strengthen community land and forest rights, empower communities to manage their shared assets effectively, curtail deforestation, and ultimately combat global climate change.

View the full story and learn more »

• The Human Element of Mangrove Management

“The Human Element of Mangrove Management” navigates the need for a more robust analysis of the ways land governance, resource rights arrangements, and land use planning — the social aspects of the conservation challenge — affect mangrove conservation and rehabilitation.

View the photo essay and learn more »

• Unpacking Land, Conflict, and Sustainable Development in Liberia

As Liberia and other countries around the world take steps to strengthen land governance, it is important to be mindful of the importance of addressing land disputes. And while addressing the complex issues around land disputes can be challenging, USAID has developed practical recommendations to help guide programs and decision making.

View the full story and learn more »

• Tajikistan’s Youth are Changing the Way We Look at Land Rights

As part of the U.S. Government’s Feed the Future initiative, USAID has helped support an effort to integrate land rights into school curriculums by establishing the course materials, which include a textbook and a fact-sheet on ways to resolve common land disputes. Adults may not always recognize how influential youth can be. But in Tajikistan, USAID knows that youth often serve as a bridge of information, helping their families understand and adopt new practices.

View the photo essay and learn more »