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updated: 31 July, 2007
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Definitions

Access to land: Access to land refers to the ability to use land and other natural resources, to control the resources and to transfer the rights to the land and take advantage of other opportunities.

Enhanced access to land: Enhanced access to land includes three main aspects:

  • strengthening land tenure security and land rights
  • increasing the amount of land that people have access to
  • improving the productivity of land

Alternatives to enhancing access to land for agriculture include promoting non-farm activities and urbanization.

Land Tenure: Land tenure refers to the rules, authorities, institutions, rights and norms that govern access to and control over land and related resources. It defines the rules and rights that govern the appropriation, cultivation and use of natural resources in a given space or piece of land. It governs who can use what resources, for how long and under what conditions. Strictly speaking, it is not the land itself that is owned but the rights and duties related to it.

Land tenure systems are highly complex. At national and local levels they include a multiplicity of overlapping (and at times contradictory) rules, laws, customs, traditions, perceptions and regulations that determine how people use, control and transfer land. This has significant implications for the analysis of land tenure issues and their significance in poverty reduction. In many cases different people would describe the land tenure situation pertaining to a specific parcel of land in very different terms. A government official may see it as public land, owned and controlled by the government or a local council. A local chief, on the other hand, may believe that he is responsible for the piece of land, holding it in trust for his clan or lineage group. The male head of a household who is presently cultivating the land may see it as his, to be inherited one day by his male heirs. Finally, a pastoralist living nearby may see the parcel of land as an area on which he has the rights to graze his cattle during certain months of the year. This example illustrates how government officials, chiefs, farmers and pastoralists could all, perhaps quite legitimately, claim rights to the same piece of land, on the basis of different land tenure laws, customs and regimes.

Land tenure security: Land tenure security refers to people’s rights to control and manage a parcel of land, using it, disposing of its produce and engaging in transactions, including transfers. Land tenure security has three main characteristics:

    • duration – how long will different land rights last?
    • protection – will land rights be protected if they are challenged or threatened?
    • robustness – are the holders of land rights able to use the land and dispose of the rights without interference from others?

    Source: IFAD