Eswatini is one of the few surviving absolute monarchies in the world. Formerly known as Swaziland, the country’s name was changed to Eswatini by King Mswati III in April 2018. Eswatini is a small landlocked country of 17,364 km² with a population of 1.2 million people and a density of 63 people/km2. Despite its small size it contains four agro-ecological zones. It shares borders with South Africa and Mozambique.
Socio-economic indicators
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Land Area
1,720,000 ha
GDP/Capita
8,856.8 USD
Total population
1,192,270
Urban population
23.8 %
Land-related indicators
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Agricultural land
71.1 %
Perceived tenure security
52.2 %
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11 March 2022
Eswatini, formerly known as Swaziland, is a “ticking time bomb”, according to Hlobi Dlamini, a gender and women’s rights advocate from that country. Reflecting on the state of Eswatini in the wake of a June 2021 uprising in pursuit of democracy and human rights, Dlamini said it is only a matter of…
11 November 2021
The issue of land, especially its redistribution, remains contentious in South Africa 27 years after the formal end of apartheid. Land redistribution was promised at the end of apartheid. The failure of the African National Congress (ANC) government to do so is emblematic of its failure to…
20 October 2021
With a total of 65 participants (37% women) from 14 countries (Angola, Burundi, Cameroon, Cote d’Ivoire, Eswatini, Ethiopia, Ghana, Guinea Bissau, Kenya, Malawi, Niger, Pakistan, Sudan and Uganda) the 10th and last Capitalization Meeting of the EU Land Governance Transversal Project, was virtually…
Over half of ever-widowed women in Swaziland reported that they had been dispossessed of their property
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By Ian Scoones, Professorial Fellow at the Institute of Development Studies, and the Director of the ESRC STEPS Centre at Sussex
The expansion of sugar production in southern Africa has been dramatic. From its early beginnings in Natal to the huge commercial estates across the region established…
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