Country: Mali

Agrarian reforms key to climate justice

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A new briefing paper, Land for Food and Climate Justice: The Case for Redistributive Agrarian Reforms released today underscores a powerful yet underutilized solution to the intersecting crises of climate change, biodiversity loss, food insecurity, and inequality: redistributive agrarian reform. Drawing on case studies from Argentina, Mali, and India, the publication presents evidence that placing land and ecosystems under the control of Indigenous Peoples, small-scale food providers, and rural communities is key to achieving climate justice and food systems transformation.

The paper, based on the landmark report Lords of the Land: Transnational Landowners, Inequality and the Case for Redistribution, highlights how global land inequality and resource grabbing—particularly so-called “green grabs” made in the name of environmental protection—are accelerating environmental destruction and undermining human rights.

“Corporate control over land is not only driving environmental collapse but also pushing millions into hunger and marginalization,” said Philip Seufert, policy officer of FIAN International.

“The solution lies in the hands of those who have always safeguarded ecosystems – small-scale food providers and Indigenous Peoples. It’s time to prioritize redistributive tenure policies as a climate strategy.”

Key messages from the briefing include:

  • Land inequality is a major driver of environmental degradation. One percent of farms now control over 70% of farmland globally. This concentration of land is deeply linked to increased carbon emissions, deforestation, and biodiversity loss.
  • “Green grabs” are displacing communities. The paper shows that over 20% of large-scale land deals today are made in the name of environmental objectives. These land grabs, including those earmarked for carbon markets and biodiversity schemes, often displace people who are the most effective stewards of land and ecosystems.
  • Small-scale food providers feed the world. Despite using just 35% of cropland, they produce over half of the world’s food, manage landscapes more sustainably, and support greater biodiversity. Their continued viability depends on control over land and natural resources.

The briefing paper includes three case studies that illustrate how rural communities in Argentina, Mali and India are setting the foundations for sustainable and just food systems, anchored in human rights and social and environmental justice.

The briefing paper calls for a bold rethinking of climate and food policy: agrarian reform and redistributive tenure policies must be recognized not only as social justice tools but as ecological imperatives.

“Small-scale food providers, Indigenous Peoples and rural communities are not just victims of climate change – they are frontline climate actors,” said Philip Seufert.

“If we are serious about just transitions and climate justice, land redistribution must be at the center of global policy efforts.”

Download the full briefing paper here.

For media inquiries or interviews, please contact: sullivan@fian.org

Mali: Grassroots groups confront climate crisis with strategies rooted in agrarian justice

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Mali is often cited in international discussions on “climate security”. Intergovernmental reports tend to describe the West African country as particularly vulnerable to climate change – notably droughts – and mired in war and conflict.  A collaborative action-research project between FIAN International and peasant movements in the Malian Convergence Against Land Grabbing (CMAT) challenges this portrayal and highlights progressive grassroots mobilizations on climate and land rights.

Community participation

From 2018 to 2020 FIAN and CMAT worked on the pilot implementation of village land commissions in the south of Mali. The commissions are based on a new agricultural land law which recognizes customary rights and draws inspiration from the UN Committee on World Food Security’s (CFS) land tenure guidelines.

“The project highlighted the inextricable link between safeguarding community rights and confronting climate change. It showed that social and environmental justice and right to land go hand in hand,” said FIAN International’s Secretary General Sofia Monsalve.

Climate security debates often tend to focus on alleged threats to the national security of richer countries. A week before the Glasgow COP26 summit, US security agencies collectively released a series of reports painting a dire picture of the future and signaling the tendency towards further militarization of climate debates.

One of the research-action findings was that security analysts looking at Mali tend to focus on conflicts between already marginalized groups, rather than the impact of extractive projects led by foreign and national elites such as large-scale gold mining, corporate agribusiness and the privatization of forests. This interest in securitization and “management” of climate change impacts can be used to justify top-down interventions and close space for democratic participation in climate and land policy.

Since 2018 village land commissions in southern Mali have been a positive experiment in grassroots mobilization aimed not only at enabling the recognition and protection of territorial rights, but also fostering new forms of community participation, control over natural resources and political engagement. Social movements and communities have been able to take stock of their natural resources and collectively establish local conventions of resource management.

“Everyone regained awareness of the role of land, of natural resources within the communities. Local agreements tied to the village land commissions are making it possible to establish good, inclusive and equitable governance based on shared principles and values,” wrote Massa Koné, spokesperson of the Malian Convergence Against Land Grabbing (CMAT) in an evaluation of the project.

Land rights key to tackling climate crisis

This approach has allowed the commissions to tackle environmental issues such as loss of animal biodiversity, water pollution from gold mining and contested land management rules, such as restrictions on cutting trees and on sale of charcoal. They have also sought to renegotiate traditional sustainable practices which were previously often based on customary relations between ethnic groups, such as allowing livestock to graze stalks of crops after harvests which also fertilizes soils.

The movements in the Malian Convergence Against Land Grabbing are also interested in applying traditional agricultural techniques in dialogue with new collective lessons on agroecology from international peasant movements which provide healthy and sustainable alternatives outside of corporate high-input (and fossil fuel-based) farming. In conjunction, these efforts are helping to prevent the takeover of land by carbon-heavy projects and to protect local vegetation without sidelining communities, as many environmental preservation projects do. Equally important is the role of land security and community dialogue in allowing adaptation and resilience to environmental change.

The participatory approach of village land commissions recognizes existing village political structures – by including customary authorities and representatives – and also addresses inequalities by including representatives of youth and women, who traditionally participate less in the public sphere. The new land law also establishes that at least 15 percent of land titling by the state or territorial collectivities must be attributed to collectives or associations of women and youth.

The FIAN International/CMAT action-research project has helped to demonstrate that community rights to land, food and the environment are not only threatened by climate change but that safeguarding them is at the heart of any possibility for counteracting the climate crisis and confronting the extractive and growth-led model at its origin.

Strengthening community and indigenous land rights and promoting agroecological food production are part of the missing pathways of climate action. They are key bottom-up solutions given little attention in official climate summits and reports. Mali’s village land commissions are an attempt to enact some of the principles of agrarian climate justice, an alternative framework and political proposal which recognizes the interdependence between ecological regeneration and justice for historically oppressed agrarian groups.  

 

My land – my life! West African Caravan reaches Dakar

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In the name of the Caravan, Samba Gueye, President of the Senegalese organization CNCR, handed over the Convergence book to the Secretary General of Senegal’s Ministry of Integration. “Every day communities are denied access to their lands and water as these resources are privatized. To protect the rights of family farmers, to guarantee their access to land, water and peasant seeds, is a requirement for peace”, Ibrahima Coulibaly, President of the National coordination of peasants organizations (CNOP) in Mali, states.

As echoed in the Convergence book, the Caravan calls on West African governments to protect natural resources from the exploitation of transnational corporations and other actors.  Under the heading of  “Ma terre – c’est ma vie!” (“my land- that’s my life!”), participants and supporters of the Caravan urge governments to back small-scale farmers, fishers, women and young people in their struggle towards the access to and control over natural resources.

Departing from Burkina Faso on 3 March, the Caravan has counted with more than 200 participants from across 15 countries in the region, as well as reached out to thousands of people during local events and through regional and international media. “We are the Caravan of peace, of people’s integration in ECOWAS, of participative, inclusive and sustainable development”, Massa Koné, spokesperson from the Malian convergence against land grabbing (CMAT), says.

Organized by the Global Convergence of Struggles for Land and Water, this event follows the declaration “Land and Water Rights, a common struggle” an outcome of the subregional platform in West Africa, created in 2015 in Nyeleni, Mali, and key discussions at the  World Social Forum in Tunis in 2015 and the African Social Forum in Dakar in 2014.

FIAN International, together with other civil society organizations, has proactively supported the Caravan, as policies on land, water and seeds must primarily benefit the people and small-scale farmers.

NOTES TO EDITORS:

-The Convergence Book is a tool developed by the Caravan, which lists both demands to authorities and alternative solutions regarding policies on land, water and seeds  in West Africa. (available in French).

– The Global Convergence of Land and Water Struggles – West Africa is composed of more than 300 organizations and networks representing affected people of land and water grabbing in rural, peri-urban and urban areas; evictees of popular districts; youth; women and; NGOs from the 15 countries of the ECOWAS and the West African Economic and Monetary Union (UEMOA ) spaces.

-You can find the latest updates on the Caravan social media platforms on Facebook, Twitter and Flickr, as well as on Youtube

For more information about the Caravan, please contact Seufert@fian.org 

Mali to host next Global Dialogue on the Right to Adequate Food and Nutrition

Posted on by fredsaxo

Weeks after the last session in Dhaka, Bangladesh, the next Global Dialogue lands in Bamako, engaging with national governments’ representatives and grassroots organizations from across West Africa. Organized by the National Coordination of Peasants’ Organizations (CNOP), together with the Centre for Equity Studies (CES) and FIAN International, the event will serve as a platform to share and build knowledge in fighting hunger and human rights. 

For two consecutive days starting on 28th June, policy endeavors and developments around the right to adequate food and nutrition in Brazil, India, Mali and other West African countries will be showcased and discussed. After being kicked off by the Malian Ministry of Rural Development, the first day will include the presentation of the strategies for tackling food and nutrition insecurity in Mali, as well as of the laws and programs that brought about success in Brazil and India.  

Brazil and India represent two distinct experiences of significant state efforts to advance the progressive realization of the human right to food and nutrition, and their examples may therefore be insightful for others. Brazil and India will not be presented as models for emulation, but rather as a source of indicating viable choices when countries work on policies and program towards ensuring food security.

Participants will be playing a major role on the second day, which will be devoted to the exchange of views around strategic issues such as “major challenges concerning food and nutrition security in your country” and “extent to which the Brazil and Indian experiences provide guidance to tackle hunger and malnutrition.”

The participation of the Malian government, as well as of the Malian Convergence against Land Grabbing (CMAT), will provide a unique opportunity to debate and build knowledge on the country’s policy endeavors to ensure food security as well as make this next Global Dialogue distinctive. 

For media enquiries, please contact delrey[at]fian.org

Right to Water and Land, a Common Struggle in West Africa

Posted on by fredsaxo

Water and land are vital natural resources and part of our common heritage. Although their safekeeping and governance must be monitored and preserved by communities for the common good of our societies, external factors are increasingly thwarting them from doing so. This tendency is characteristic in Sub-Saharan Africa, despite about 70 per cent of the population depending on peasant family farming.  With the aim of building strategies and strengthening the struggle of social movements and grassroots organizations, FIAN International will support the “Sub-regional –West Africa-Conference of the Convergence of Land and Water Struggles” in Nyeleni, Mali, from 25-27 June. 

Although access and control of natural resources is largely determined by local and national power structures, they also have a significant international component. Trade agreements and investment, international development projects and activities of transnational corporations (TNCs) have become factors increasingly important and harmful to natural resources other around the world, including Africa. In doing so, they have often been reinforcing existing unequal power structures and contributing to the further marginalization of disadvantaged population groups such as women, children and communities. Land and water grabbing in all forms has become a global phenomenon as a result.

In response to the rising threats to millions of people’s livelihoods, local communities and organizations around the world resist and struggle against the current system by claiming their rights and presenting alternative and adequate solutions. Past examples include the Dakar gathering in October 2014 as part of the African Social Forum, which resulted into a series of discussions between social movements and civil society organizations defending the rights to land and water; and the Dakar to Tunis Declaration, whereby these actors reflected a continued dialogue aimed at building a global convergence of land and water struggles. 

In alignment with these outcomes, the conference will offer a platform to share experiences of struggles for land and water in several West-African countries, in order to identify and analyze main dynamics, as well as study thoroughly relevant processes and instruments, both international and regional. The exchange of views and discussions will provide an opportunity for reflection, to strategize engagement in these sub-regional processes and establish a platform of the Global Convergence of Land and Water Struggles in West Africa that reaches out to and impacts national policies.

The conference is organized by the Coordination Malienne contre l’Accaparement des Terres (CMAT), Coalition pour la Protection du Patrimoine Génétique Africain (COPAGEN), Conseil National de Concertation et de Coopération des Ruraux Sénégal (CNCR), Synergie Paysanne Bénin (SNYPA) and Floraison.  It counts on the support of the Réseau des organisations paysannes et de producteurs de l’Afrique de l’Ouest (ROPPA), La Via Campesina, World Forum of Fisher Peoples (WFFP), COCIDES, FIAN International, GRAIN, Transnational Institute (TNI), Cooperation for the Development of Emerging Countries (COSPE) and Terra Nuova.

For media enquiries, please contact seufert[at]fian.org or delrey[at]fian.org 

The right to food: An assessment of landgrabbing in Mali

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From 25 November to 05 December 2013, FIAN International undertook a research mission in Mali in the region of Ségou. This was done at the demand of the communities affected by land grabbing, and the Malian convergence against land grabbing (CMAT – Convergence Malienne contre l'Accaparement des Terres).

A case dossier was prepared by Timothé Feodoroff (TNI) based on a study by Philip Seufert and Valentin Hategekimana titled “Accaparement des terres et droits humains au Mali“, which is a detailed report of the findings of FIAN's visit that uses the FAO Tenure Guidelines to analyze three cases of land grabbing and monitor governance of tenure from a human rights perspective.

 

This case dossier is available in English and French.

Land grabbing and human rights in Mali

Posted on by fredsaxo

From 25 November to 05 December 2013, FIAN International undertook a research mission in Mali in the region of Ségou. This was done at the demand of the communities affected by land grabbing, and the Malian convergence against land grabbing (CMAT – Convergence Malienne contre l’Accaparement des Terres).

After the mission, a detailed report of the findings of FIAN’s visit and a human rights analysis was produced, which includes data of the three cases of land grabbing visited in three villages namely: Sanamadougou-Saou, Sansanding and San.

This report is one of the first reports using the Tenure Guidelines to analyze cases and monitor governance of tenure from a human rights perspective, and provides an extensive analysis of violations on the basis of human rights, national legislation and policies. Moreover, the report highlights the struggle of villagers and their supporting organizations against land grabbing, while providing recommendations to the State of Mali.

FIAN International has been following the three cases of land grabbing visited in Mali for a long time. The mission also had the opportunity to meet with the authorities at different levels and the authors of the report contacted the companies concerned in the cases of  Sanamadougou-Saou and Sansanding for their opinion. Moreover, the mission was facilitated by CMAT, who was an important source of information during the drafting of the report.

Read the full report below

In need of a Policy Shift: Investing in Agricultural Alternatives

Posted on by fredsaxo

The policy brief “Policy Shift: Investing in Agricultural Alternatives” takes seriously the call for a paradigm shift in favour of investment in agricultural alternatives by identifying a set of ten key policy changes required to support and promote positive alternative investments. The approach adopted is both a normative one, informed by prevailing human rights norms, and an empirical one, informed by practical, on-the-ground examples of positive agricultural investments.

In order to set up the framework for such analysis, four premises or starting points are outlined at the beginning. The brief ends with a discussion as to how these recommendations can feed into existing policy initiatives and regulatory tendencies around agricultural investment, most notably the ongoing discussion on responsible agricultural investment (rai) at the Committee on World Food Security.

Read policy brief below: