This paper develops a theoretical model of land leasing that includes transaction costs, risk pooling motives and non-tradable productive inputs. It investigates the empirical implications of land contracts using data collected from four villages in Ethiopia.The paper shows that sharecropping is the dominant contract if transaction costs are negligible, but that a rental contract may arise if transaction costs decrease with increasing the tenant’s share of output.

This Topic Guide addresses the threat that climate change poses to food security and poverty reduction achievements. The peer-reviewed guide explains how programming around climate-smart agriculture can help adapt and build resilience to climate change – at the same time stimulating economic growth and poverty reduction in the agricultural sector.

Starting with a discussion of the scientific versus the traditional methods of land evaluation and perception, the authors formulate a methodological framework to integrate both perspectives into a geographic-information/expert-system environment aimed at sustainable development of a rural community, and present a case study in Central Mexico.

The injustices of the land issue in South Africa under apartheid are well documented. A programme of land reform since then has had varied success. The authors argue that there is a great deal of empirical evidence to show that the private sector and markets make major contributions to South Africa’s development in general and to land reform in particular. It is in this light that this report looks at the contribution made by the private sector to land reform, both through organised land reform initiatives and in the ordinary course of their business.

This paper looks for the possible explanations for the land productivity differential between high caste and low caste farm households in Nepal. The paper indicates that caste position still plays a vital role in rural areas of Nepal.The paper finds that: land productivity is higher among low caste households. However, in case of owner-operated plots, the land productivity differential between low caste and high caste is found to be insignificant after controlling for land quality and household characteristics. This difference remains highly significant in case of rented in plots.

Land tenure security is crucial for women's empowerment and a prerequisite for building secure and resilient communities. Tenure is affected by many and often contradictory sets of rules, laws, customs, traditions, and perceptions. For most rural women, land tenure is complicated, with access and ownership often layered with barriers present in their daily realities: discriminatory social dynamics and strata, unresponsive legal systems, lack of economic opportunities, and lack of voice in decision making.

Market solutions based on the trade of carbon offset credits remain a dominant feature in international climate change negotiations. This paper undertakes a preliminary assessment of potential of climate change mitigation projects by evaluating Clean Development Mechanism (CDM) projects related to agriculture and land use change in Latin America. Results suggest that potential benefits of carbon markets in the agriculture and forestry sectors are often overstated, with failures in the areas of additionality, project accountability and sustainable development.

There is a common view and belief that women are the ones that do the farming in Africa while the men do not work much. This paper seeks to find explanations to why land productivity is lower on land rented out by female landlord households than on land rented out by male landlord households in the Ethiopian highlands. The authors find that female landlords have tenants who are older, own less oxen, are more related, and under longer-term contracts.

This report argues that land reform, both tenancy reform and redistribution of ceiling surplus lands to the landless, is important to poverty alleviation.The paper argues that in addition to production benefits, land reform helps to change the local political structure by giving more voice to the poor. Re-distributive land reform, whether through market-assisted land reform programmes or otherwise, should remain a substantive policy issue for poverty reduction.

Malawi’ s smallholder agriculture is facing a crisis, particularly in the more populated south. There is an insidious combination of land shortage, continuous cultivation of maize, declining soil fertility, low yields, deforestation, poverty and high population growth rate. Smallholder farmers are doing what they can to maintain household livelihoods under these difficult circumstances, however many of their actions, which are necessary for short term survival, such as the cultivation of hillsides, are not sustainable in the long term.

This document summarises the proceedings from a conference organised by International Institute for Environment and Development (IIED) , Natural Resource insitute (NRI) and the Royal African Society in November 2004.The conference brought together a wide range of interest groups including, African policy makers, academics and civil society representatives, as well as representatives of the private sector and international agencies, to debate the way ahead for land rights and land reforms in Africa.

This brief explores the reform of land tenure institutions which re-emerged in the 1990s, and asks if these reforms are any more gender sensitive than those of the past?The paper highlights that a focus of the recent reforms has been on land titling, designed to promote security of tenure and stimulate land markets. The reforms have often been driven by domestic and external neoliberal coalitions, with funding from global and regional organisations which have argued that private property rights are essential for a dynamic agricultural sector.