Welcome to the Community Land Rights blog, featuring notes and insights from experts and organizations working on community land and resource rights across the world.
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Dispossessed: New Study Shows Indigenous Peoples and Local Communities—1.5 Billion Worldwide—Lack Legal Rights to Almost Three Quarters of Their Land
Presented at international conference in Bern, findings suggest weak tenure threatens food security, economic development, political stability and environment; failure to recognize rights may play role in fate of “Failed States” A new global study, released on the eve of…
Harvesting Under Fear
As seen on Landscapes for People, Food, and Nature They harvested their coffee during the dead of the night, using the faint light from their mobile phones to guide them, trying not to get caught by forest rangers on their…
COP20 President, Private Sector Rep React to Release of Securing Rights, Combating Climate Change
In response to the release of "Securing Rights, Combating Climate Change," private sector representatives and government officials released the following statements: Peru's environment minister and COP20 president Manuel Pulgar Vidal: “The climate negotiations in Lima later this year offer a…
Technical Brief: Land rights in the Post-2015 Agenda
In this technical brief, the Open Working Group's Zero Draft is urged to include targets on secure rights to land and natural resources, particularly for women and men most in need, in recognition that they are fundamental to poverty eradication, food security, women’s empowerment,…
Policy brief: Community land rights in the “Zero Draft” of the Post-2015 Agenda
The United Nation's post-2015 development agenda’s transformative potential depends on the extent to which it can address the structural factors that entrench global inequalities ranging from poverty to food insecurity. Many organizations consider secure and equitable rights to land and…
Times of India: Tribals use GPS to claim forest land rights
As seen on the Times of India VADODARA: Amid their struggle to get forest land rights in Gujarat, tribals have found a friend in a gadget that gives convincing evidence about their claims over land under the Forest Rights Act.…
National Geographic: A Bottom-Line Focus For Solving Mining Conflicts
As seen on the National Geographic The lure of precious metals and other natural resources has long been a source of conflict in Latin America, from the Andes to the Amazon and most everywhere else. But new research has begun…
Global Call for Inclusion of Community Land Rights in the UN’s Post-2015 Sustainable Development Agenda
Washington, D.C. (17 April, 2014)—A new policy brief released by the Rights and Resources Initiative (RRI), Oxfam, and the Secretariat of the International Land Coalition (ILC) calls for the inclusion of “community land rights” in the United Nations’ Post-2015 Development…
New Study: Indigenous Peoples, Local Communities Face Slowdown in Recognition of Rights to Land and Resources despite More Verbal Commitments by Governments, Corporations
More than three out of every five hectares of forestland still claimed by governments of low and middle income countries; progress on the ground remains elusive LONDON (5 February, 2014)—A recent spate of high-profile pronouncements and court rulings that support…
IIED: Saving the forests for last – in the hope, at last, of saving the forests
As seen IIED The Sustainable Development Goals, which nations are set to negotiate soon, must not only mention saving the world's forests, but also explain how to do this, says Duncan Macqueen. A cocktail of planetary proportions – and indeed…
IRIN NEWS: Indonesian indigenous groups fight climate change with GPS mapping
As seen on IRIN News BANGKOK, 8 January 2014 (IRIN) - Indigenous communities in Indonesia are using GPS technology to demarcate the boundaries of their ancestral lands, a move many believe could also help mitigate the negative effects of climate change.…
Norges Bank Investment Management: Letter to the Rainforest Foundation
As seen on Norges Bank Investment Management Thank you for meeting NBIM on several occasions over the past years to discuss tropical deforestation in Malaysia and Indonesia, with particular emphasis on palm oil. At our most recent meeting on the…
