Land rights in Africa - Horn of Africa

Land Rights	Introduction	Key principles
Africa General	West Africa	East Africa
Horn of Africa	Southern Africa	Links

Eritrea | Ethiopia| Sudan

Independent Review of Land Issues, Volume III, 2006-2007, Eastern and Southern Africa
Source: Martin Adams and Robin Palmer (eds)
Summary: This review of land issues in twenty countries in Southern and Eastern Africa is the third since 2004. The idea of conducting a regular review arose in an informal meeting of land rights activists in Pretoria in 2003 concerned about the seeming lack of progress with land reform in the region and what might be done to improve land rights delivery. It was recognised that there was a lack of systematic information as to what was actually happening and the need to track the progress of the various national programmes underway, as well as monitor land rights under serious threat. The countries covered here are Angola, Botswana, Burundi, DRC (Eastern), Eritrea, Ethiopia, Kenya, Lesotho, Malawi, Mozambique, Namibia, Rwanda, Somalia, South Africa, Sudan, Sudan Transitional States, Southern Sudan, Swaziland, Tanzania, Uganda, Zambia, Zimbabwe. Ends with concluding thoughts.
Date: June 2007
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Land Reform Highlights in Eastern Africa, 2004-5
Source: Independent Land Issues Review, Volume II, Number 2
Summary: A second volume in this series covering this region, building on that of August 2004, also published on this website. Designed to be useful for planners, programme designers, advocates, practitioners, citizens and subjects engaged in land reform. Contains an introduction, followed by land reform highlights in Burundi, Eastern DRC, Ethiopia, Kenya, Rwanda, Somalia, Sudan, Tanzania and Uganda.
Date: December 2005
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Struggling with Land Reform Issues in Eastern Africa Today
Source: Independent Land Newsletter (August 2004) edited by Nelson Marongwe and Robin Palmer
Summary: An second independent newsletter providing details of current developments in land reform and land conflicts in the Horn, East and Central Africa. Covers Burundi, Eastern DRC, Eritrea, Ethiopia, Kenya, Rwanda, Somalia, Sudan (including origins of the Darfur crisis), Tanzania and Uganda. As in Southern Africa, land is a highly contested and contentious issue right across the region. A short case study in Apac, Northern Uganda, symbolises the dilemmas of land reforms across the continent in an era of privatisation. Some are very clearly gaining at the expense of others.
Date: August 2004
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Women’s Land and Property Rights in three East Africa Countries
Source: UNIFEM (Makumi Mwagiru)
Summary: Examines women’s land and property rights in Kenya, the Sudan and Ethiopia. Considers the legal and other impediments hindering these rights in situations of conflict and reconstruction. Outlines the practical problems faced by women in connection with the legal and traditional structures regarding land and property rights, and makes some suggestions about how the situation can be rectified.
Date: February 1998
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Horn of Africa: Eritrea

Women’s Access to Land and Property Rights in Eritrea
Source: UNIFEM (Tsehainesh Tekle)
Summary: Includes legal civil rights, property rights, customary land laws, legal reforms, problems of traditional land tenure, the thinking behind the Eritrean Government’s Land Proclamation, its basic tenets and the process of implementing it.
Date: February 1998
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Horn of Africa: Ethiopia

Ethiopia: Reforming Land Tenure NEW
Source: Review of African Political Economy, 116, June 2008, pp.2o3-20 (Wibke Crewett and Benedikt Korf)
Summary: Land policy in Ethiopia has been controversial since the fall of the Derg in 1991. While the current Ethiopian government has implemented a land policy that is based on state ownership of land, many agricultural economists and international donor agencies have propagated some form of privatised land ownership. Traces the antagonistic arguments of the two schools of thought how their antagonistic principles of fairness vs. efficiency are played out and have trickled down in the formulation of the federal and regional land policies especially on the new Oromia regional land policy.
Date: June 2008
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Note: Oxfam is grateful to the editors of ROAPE and to its Publisher, Routledge, for permission to reproduce this article on this site.

Land Registration and Women’s Land Rights in Amhara Region, Ethiopia
Source: Askale Teklu (IIED Securing Land Rights in Africa Research Report 4)
Summary: Covers land-tenure system in Amhara Region, the land rights registration process, women’s access to and control of land, land use by men and women, marital property rights, inheritance rights, female-headed households, legal services, conclusions and recommendations.
Date: November 2005
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Note: Oxfam GB is grateful to IIED for permission to post this Research Report, which is one of a series of seven on Securing Land Rights in Africa, covering Mozambique and Ghana, as well as Ethiopia, with the summary report 'Can Land Registration Serve Poor and Marginalised Groups?' on the IIED website at http://www.iied.org/pubs/display.php?o=12518IIED

A Research Report on Land Tenure and Agricultural Development in Ethiopia –executive summary
Source: Ethiopian Economic Association and Ethiopian Economic Policy Research Institute
Summary: A comprehensive research report covers the literature, includes a large survey of farm households throughout Ethiopia, and surveys the opinions of professionals. Land tenure is now a hotly debated issue; land scarcity and degradation are serious. Tenure security is seen as more important than the form of ownership. Almost three-quarters of farmers surveyed fear future distributions of land. Government is afraid that moving from state to private ownership will lead to massive evictions through distress sales, but over 90% farmers said they would not sell their land if they could. Farmers are more pragmatic than professionals. Government believes that failings of the system can be compensated through increases in productivity as a result of its extension programme, but this is highly doubtful. Larger size holdings perform better than smaller. Informal markets are starting despite a formal prohibition – this should be encouraged. Vast majority believe existing land tenure system is a major constraint to agricultural productivity and that government should open a forum for wider debate on land tenure.
Date: October 2002
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Horn of Africa: Sudan

Whose Land is it? Commons and Conflict States. Why the Ownership of the Commons Matters in Making and Keeping Peace NEW
Source: Rights and Resources Initiative (Liz Alden Wily)
Summary: Addresses the tenure fate of three commons: the 30 million hectares of pasture lands of Afghanistan which represent 45 percent of the total land area and are key to livelihood and water catchment in that exceedingly dry country; the 5.7 million hectares of timber-rich tropical forests in Liberia, 59 percent of the total land area; and the 125 million hectares of savannah in Sudan, half the area of that largest state of Africa. All three resources have a long history as customary properties of local communities and also share a 20th century history as the property of the state.
Date: July 2008
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Post-War Development and the Land Question in South Sudan NEW
Source: N. Shanmugaratnam (Paper presented at the International Symposium on Resources Under Stress, Afrasian Centre for Peace & Development, Ryukoku University, Kyoto, Japan, 23-24 February 2008)
Summary: Contains introduction; resources and civil war in South Sudan; the Sudanese Peoples’ Liberation Movement and the land question; issues for discussion and further study; the future of customary tenure; conclusions.
Date: February 2008
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