Transcript Slide 1
Lecture Series: ‘Agriculture, Rural Employment and Inclusive Growth’
Camilla Toulmin
Director, International Institute for Environment and Development (IIED)
Whose Food – Whose Farm?
Tuesday 4 October 2011
Whose food, whose farm?
SID Lecture, ISS The Hague
Camilla Toulmin, IIED
October 4th 2011
Land tenure and international
investments in agriculture.
A report by the High Level
Panel of Experts on Food
Security and Nutrition
Recommendations to the UN-CFS, Rome October 17-21, 2011
Drivers of price volatility
and food insecurity
•Short
•Medium
•Long term
Recommendations include
measures for stocks, trade,
speculation, demand,
investment in agriculture,
price in externalities,
promote FS strategies.
Study Team members and Steering group Chair
Estimated Inventories of areas involved in large-scale land investment
Not just land but water too….
Title
Early impacts
Huge diversity of investments and context
Growing research base, but no definitive
answers
Growing evidence of inadequate
consultation and compensation, local
conflict/resistance, land/resource loss – but
few studies have considered investment
project as a whole
Risks exacerbated when wider pressures
on land taken into account
Who, why and how?
Multiple interests, domestic, regional,
global; long-standing commercial
players plus new players
Food, feed, flowers, biofuel, forests…
Governments – ministries and agencies
– play a key role
Domestic investors significant
Principal drivers
Public policy
Market forces
Environmental
pressures
Public policy measures
Biofuel targets
Food security
Investment
promotion
Market forces
Rising demand and
prices for food, feed
and fuels
Growing interest in
land as investment
asset
Environmental pressures
Water scarcity
Drought
Conservation –
wildlife and
landscape
Forestry and carbon
markets
Land tenure systems
Gap between statutory and customary
law and practice
Legal pluralism + institutional shopping
Bundle of rights – primary/secondary
rights; individual/collective
Very low coverage documented rights
Slow, high cost, inaccessible processes
Title
Nomadic Pastorialists
Title
Small and large scale farming
Long-standing debate on economies of
scale. Up-downstream supply chain
linkages
What evidence of difference in social,
gender, environmental performance?
Sharing value, joint ventures
Joint ventures/co-ownership
Contract farming
Tenancy/sharecropping
Community leases
Mix of ownership, voice, risk, reward
The main actors involved in international
land deals
Multiple instruments, what power?
High level UN principles based on
Human Rights (e.g. Indigenous and
Tribal Peoples, Right to Food, Business
and Human Rights)
Voluntary Guidelines, PRAI,
Roundtables and certification for
sustainable palm oil, soy, forestry,
biofuels, etc.)
National level measures
Land policies and property rights – what
recognition customary, collective,
unwritten land and water rights?
Environment and social impact
assessment – a legal requirement?
Fiscal policy – tax/subsidies on land,
farm production, credit, capital
equipment
Recommendations from HLPE
Measures to be undertaken by:
Host country
Corporate investors
Donor governments
Home governments of countries where
investor is headquartered
Civil society actors
UN CFS
Host country government
Inclusive debate on agricultural
pathways and long term choices
Strengthen and respect local rights over
land and natural resources, FPIC
Promote smallscale farming, encourage
inclusive business models, demand
better deals from investors
Investment contracts
Legal support for better deals
Open-up contracts for wider scrutiny
Better investment relies on better
contracts
Who participates, when and how? Local
vs. national actors
Transparency, monitoring,accountability
Better corporate practice
Adhere to legal responsibilities re
human rights
Follow best practice re FPIC,
consultation with local community, and
industry guidelines re environmental
and social impacts
Donor governments
Align bilateral and multilateral activities
Fulfil G8 and G20 commitments to
increase funding for agriculture
Increase research to sustainable
intensification, agro-ecological methods,
bridging the yield gap and building
institutions/knowledge/social capital
Figure 8.1: Actual and agro-ecologically attainable yields for wheat in selected countries. (Source: Bruinsma 2009)
Investors’ Home Governments
Remind governments of their
responsibility to ensure their companies
operate to highest standards re human
rights and environmental management
Establish mechanism for redress for
people in third countries to hold
company/investor to account
Civil society and farmer groups
Support farmer representation incountry, and social movements of rural
poor + monitor investment contracts
Open up in-country dialogue, link
farmers with parliament, press
Strengthen international info sharing on
land acquisition and global campaign
strategies
UN-Committee on Food Security
Govts should report annually on aligning
investment and food security
Govts to abolish biofuel targets and
subsidies
Approve VG, and establish observatory
for tenrue and right to food
Support regional processes eg. AU-LPI
Ensure effective consultation on PRAI
Figure 4: The Global Banana Bottleneck – from Latin America/Caribbean to the UK
Source: Vorley 2003:51
www.iied.org
Title - Mali
Lecture Series: ‘Agriculture, Rural Employment and Inclusive Growth’
Camilla Toulmin
Director, International Institute for Environment and Development (IIED)
Phil Woodhouse
School of Environment and Development, University of Manchester
Chair: Max Spoor (ISS)