April 9, 2013

United Nations Special Rapporteur on the Right to Food

On 16 April the Special Rapporteur wrote to the European Commission, the Irish Presidency of the European Union, the permanent representations of EU member states in Geneva, and MEPs, on the subject of EU biofuels policy.

The ILC Global Land Forum 2013 is taking place in Guatemala, a country that experienced radical transformation of its agricultural sector and rural landscape in recent past. After a 36-year civil war, Guatemala remains one of the poorest countries in Latin America, with over half of rural people and nearly two-thirds of indigenous peoples living in poverty. The focus of the Forum is on territoriality, which brings together power, society and space.

Although capital growth in South Africa's residential property market has slowed down in recent years, demand for residential property has remained strong at the lower end of the market. This has been driven by a shortage of housing and growing disposable income in less affluent households.

Read more at http://www.urbanlandmark.org.za/downloads/hsa_managing_urban_land_201302.pdf

Farming communities in Africa and South Asia are becoming increasingly vulnerable to shock as the effects of climate change become a reality. This increased vulnerability, however, comes at a time when improved technology makes critical information more accessible than ever before.

The International Land Coalition announces a new initiative called the Facility in Support of Innovative and High Impact Targeted Interventions on the ground (FTI). This facility builds on the experience gained through a previous programme, ILCs Community Empowerment Facility (CEF), ‘which supported 52 small projects led by civil society organizations to apply innovative approaches that help the rural poor gain access to and control over land and other natural resources (for a total amount of USD3.5 million during the 1999-2009 period.

USAID identifies land tenure as the foundation for REDD+ success. As explained in a recent paper, global climate change cannot be addressed effectively without addressing land tenure and property rights systems. Read the entire article Here. 

The Condor Highland in South-eastern Ecuadorian Amazon, which is abundant in biodiversity and life, is threatened by copper mining. The open pit mine - Mirador - is the first of a potential 6 mines which has been granted a license even though socio-environmental studies show irreversible impacts on biodiversity and water.

If the mine goes ahead the present and future generations will inherit toxic rivers, extinct wildlife, degraded Sacred Natural Sites, and a destroyed culture and spirituality of indigenous peoples who have been living in the territory for thousands of years. 

Bern/Hamburg/Montpellier/Rome (10 June 2013) The Land Matrix partnership today launches the second phase of the Global Observatory on large scale land acquisitions. The Land Matrix Global Observatory is a tool that promotes transparency in land transactions and supports open data and open source communities focused on land deals. The thoroughly updated dataset allows tracking of large scale land acquisitions, from negotiation to implementation.

June 19, 2013

We're working hard to finalize a user-friendly interface for the Land Observatory software, which users in at least five countries are eagerly awaiting.

Our anticipated release date for this will now be by mid-July, and we'll be contacting users to help us test it and get your feedback.

In the meantime, imagine being able to map land deals here:

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And being able to filter for data here

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