Little progress in practice: Assessing transparency, inclusiveness and sustainability in large-scale land acquisitions in Africa

2022-05-16 Global Africa

Despite the progress made in terms of global and national land policy frameworks, effective changes in practices remain limited. This is particularly the case with regard to large-scale land acquisitions (LSLAs), as highlighted through this assessment of the implementation of the Voluntary Guidelines on the Responsible Governance of Tenure (VGGTs) in the framework of LSLAs in Africa.

Key results for Africa include:

78% of all deals assessed show unsatisfactory levels of VGGT uptake and implementation
20% of all deals assessed do not comply with any of the VGGT principles
87% of countries present unsatisfactory results regarding VGGT implementation
Main areas of concern include:
- Weak or non-existent consultative processes
- Lack of respect for national law and legislation, including investment and land legislation
- Low regard for legitimate tenure rights, including informal tenure of local communities and indigenous peoples
- Lack of respect for human rights
- Lack of safeguards, unlawful expropriation, and minimal application of agreed-upon compensation measures.

Even after 10 years of monitoring, a recurring issue across all deals in Africa is the continuous lack of data and the dire state of transparency.

Download the main report in English:

Little progress in practice: Assessing transparency, inclusiveness and sustainability in large-scale land acquisitions in Africa [2 MB]

Download the annexes:

Annex 1: VGGT Articles incorporated into the Land Matrix monitoring exercise [1.4 MB]

Annex 2: VGGT Technical Chapters [1.4 MB]

Annex 3: VGGT-related variables and fields from the Land Matrix [1.4 MB]

Annex 4: Scorecard for the respective overarching Land Matrix variables [1.4 MB]

Annex 5: Country pages [1 MB]

Download the country pages individually:

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