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Indigenous peoples’ rights to lands, territories, and resources

The new study by ILC confirms what we knew: indigenous peoples entertain special relationships with their lands, territories and resources, as these are central to their world view, their cultures, livelihoods, spirituality, identity, and their continued existence as distinct peoples. The author of the present study, Birgitte Feiring, is a renowned anthropologist who has worked on indigenous peoples’ rights and development for more than 25 years in several agencies worldwide, including as the ILO Chief Technical Adviser on Convention No. 169 and as an adviser to bilateral and multilateral agencies and to indigenous peoples themselves. (International Land Coalition, 2013)

• Indigenous peoples’ rights to lands, territories, and resources (pdf - 2 MB)

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Whose Land Is It? Commons and Conflict States

This paper addresses the tenure fate of three commons: the 30 million hectares of pasturelands of Afghanistan which represent 45 percent of the total land area and are key to livelihood and water catchment in that exceedingly dry country; the 5.7 million hectares of timber-rich tropical forests in Liberia, 59 percent of the total land area; and the 125 million hectares of savannah in Sudan, half the area of that largest state of Africa. All three resources have an uncountably long history as customary properties of local communities. They also share a 20th century history as the property of the state. Of course there is nothing unusual in this contradiction. Between one and two billion people on the planet today are tenants of the State (CLEP, 2008, Alden Wily, forthcoming (b)). They live on and use traditional properties on which, in the eyes of the national laws of those countries, they are no more than lawful occupants and users. When their expansive collectively-owned forest, pastoral and swamp lands are taken into account, up to five billion hectares are involved, potentially one third of the world’s total land area (Wily / RRI, 2010).

• Whose Land Is It? Commons and Conflict States (pdf - 2 MB)

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Who Owns The Land in Africa? Formal recognition of community-based land rights in Sub-Saharan Africa

This brief summarizes findings on community ownership and control of lands in 19 countries in Sub-Saharan Africa that were included in the RRI's global baseline study (RRI, 2015).

• Who Owns The Land in Africa? Formal recognition of community-based land rights in Sub-Saharan Africa (pdf - 697 KB)

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Rights to Resources in Crisis: Reviewing the Fate of Customary Tenure in Africa

This is the first in a series of briefs about modern African land tenure that provides up-to-date analysis on the status of customary land rights in Sub-Saharan Africa. The purpose of the series is to inform and help to structure advocacy and action aimed at challenging the weak legal status of customary land rights in many African countries (Wily / RRI, 2012).

• Rights to Resources in Crisis: Reviewing the Fate of Customary Tenure in Africa (pdf - 8 MB)

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Securing community land and resource rights in Africa: A guide to legal reform and best practices

This guide, produced by FERN, the Forest Peoples Programme (FPP), ClientEarth and the Centre for Environment and Development (CED), explains key aspects of law and land rights that are important for securing community ownership and control of land and resources – also referred to as secure land and resource tenure. It explains how to identify and create opportunities for law reform and offers examples of reforms that have taken place in several African countries (2014).

• Securing community land and resource rights in Africa: A guide to legal reform and best practices (pdf - 3 MB)

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Land rights and the forest peoples of Africa: Historical, legal and anthropological perspectives

FPP has published a series of five country studies, and an in-depth overview, examining indigenous peoples' land rights in the forested countries of Africa. The country studies have been produced in collaboration with African experts from Burundi, Cameroon, Democratic Republic of Congo, Rwanda and Uganda (Forest Peoples Programme, 2009).

• Land rights and the forest peoples of Africa: Historical, legal and anthropological perspectives (pdf - 1 MB)

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Land Rights Issues in International Human Rights Law

Up to one quarter of the world’s population is estimated to be landless, including 200 million people living in rural areas. For many of these people, the condition of landlessness threatens the enjoyment of a number of fundamental human rights. Access to land is important for development and poverty reduction, but also often necessary for access to numerous economic, social and cultural rights, and as a gateway for many civil and political rights. However, there is no right to land codified in international human rights law. This article, which was originally written as a briefing paper for the “Forum on Land, Business, and Human Rights” convened in Manesar, India by the Institute for Human Rights and Business in June 2009, provides a brief overview of the legal implications of access to land for a broad range of human rights. Land is a cross-cutting issue, and is not simply a resource for one human right in the international legal framework. Rights have been established in the international legal framework that explicitly relate to land access for particular groups, such as indigenous people and, to a more limited extent, women. In addition, numerous rights are affected by access to land, including the rights to housing, food, water and work, and general principles in international law also provide protections relating to access to land, such as equality and nondiscrimination in ownership and inheritance (Wickeri, Elisabeth and Kalhan, Anil, Land Rights Issues in International Human Rights Law. Malaysian Journal on Human Rights, Vol. 4, No. 10, 2010; Drexel University Earle Mack School of Law Research Paper ; Fordham Law Legal Studies Research Paper No. 1921447).

• Land Rights Issues in International Human Rights Law (pdf - 113 KB)

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What Rights? A Comparative Analysis

'What Rights? A Comparative Analysis of Developing Countries’ National Legislation on Community and Indigenous Peoples’ Forest Tenure Rights' presents a legal analysis of the national legislation that relates to Indigenous Peoples’ and communities’ forest tenure rights at a global scale by assessing whether the legal systems of 27 of the most forested developing countries of the world recognize the rights of Indigenous Peoples and communities to access, withdraw, manage, exclude and alienate to forest resources and land. The countries included in this study are home to 2.2 billion rural people and include approximately 75% of the forests in the developing world (RRI, 2012).

• What Rights? A Comparative Analysis (pdf - 2 MB)

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Legally Securing Community Lands: Principles & Paths

Land tenure specialist Liz Alden Wily's principles and paths for securing tenure of community lands (2013).

• Legally Securing Community Lands: Principles & Paths (pdf - 124 KB)

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