Land disputes are threatening the prospects of post-war reconstruction in Afghanistan. Population growth, returning refugees, opium poppy production, ethnic tension and drought have increased the pressure on the land. A growing number of rural Afghans are either landless or own plots too small for survival. Competition over pasture is leading to armed clashes between nomads and settled farmers. Neither the Karzai government nor the international community is doing enough to restore order to land relations.

As the pace of decentralisation in Africa quickens, how can external agencies help communities fulfill new management responsibilities? A study from Niger has implications for other parts of Africa where commitment to decentralised natural resource management is offering scope for radical new approaches to transferring power to local people.

Kissidougou in Guinea, West Africa, is characterised by so-called 'forest islands', relics - it was assumed -of original dense forest cover. It was also assumed that local cultivation practice was to blame for the destruction of the trees. However, as collaborative research led by the School of Oriental and African Studies, the Institute of Development Studies and Guinean researchers discovered, villagers had a different story to tell: that the forest islands had in fact been established over several generations as part of a process of deliberate forest management.