Guinea-Bissau has been described as a country of “precarious complexity”. Home to more than 20 ethnic groupings Guinea-Bissau fought one of the longest wars on the African continent to end centuries of Portuguese control. It finally obtained independence in 1974. Since 1980 the history of Guinea-Bissau has been marked by multiple military coups and extreme fragility. This political instability has driven up poverty and stalled legal reforms to secure land rights. In 2008 the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime declared Guinea-Bissau to be Africa’s first ‘narco state’. By 2019 Guinea-Bissau was the 12th poorest country in the world. It has also been identified as highly vulnerable to climate change with low lying coastal areas at risk from rising sea levels and flooding.
Socio-economic indicators
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Land Area
2,812,000 ha
GDP/Capita
1,831.4 USD
Total population
2,060,720
Urban population
43.4 %
Land-related indicators
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Agricultural land
58 %
NewsBrowse all
23 November 2022
The Land Portal published a new country portfolio for Guinea-Bissau as part of our Country Insights initiative. The initiative seeks to expand knowledge about how countries govern their land, the challenges they face, and the innovative solutions they find to manage land tenure issues. Each…
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…
08 May 2019
West Africa's native rosewood was listed as endangered last year following a huge increase in trade driven by Chinese demand
GAMAMADU, Guinea-Bissau - Before the ban, Chinese loggers drove straight through Gamamadu village to harvest its most important resource: the rosewood forest.
"So many…
Customary land tenure systems in Guinea Bissau are complex. Each of the more than 20 different ethnic groups have developed their own version of customary law and land administration practices.
EventsBrowse all
9th Capitalization Meeting of the EU Land Governance Programme
3 NOVEMBER 2020, 10.00 – 11.30 CET (9.00 – 10.30 GMT)
Project implementation in all countries and at the transversal level have been impacted by the COVID-19 pandemic. Anecdotal evidence from many countries suggest that the pandemic…
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