DEVELOPMENT-EUROPE: Coalition Campaigns For Land For The Poor

By IPS Correspondents Reprint | | Print |

Jaya Ramachandran

ROME, Feb 16 2000 (IPS) - Poverty alleviation can only be achieved if the poor are provided with access to productive assets like land, water and other natural resources, says Bruce Moore coordinator of the Popular Coalition to Eradicate Hunger and Poverty.

He said governments and civic groups around the world are becoming increasingly aware of this fact. “They realise that this is an essential condition for improving rural livelihoods and living standards and for strengthening the socio-economic viability of rural areas,” Moore told IPS.

Landlessness and lack of land tenure are common contributing causes of war, civil conflict and such natural emergencies as the siltation of water reservoirs or mudslides.

“These emergencies may be reduced in situations in which the Popular Coalition can assist governments and civil society in addressing the underlying agrarian reform issues,” he added.

The Popular Coalition is the outcome of the Conference on Hunger and Poverty convened by United Nation’s International Fund for Agricultural Development (IFAD) in Brussels, Belgium, in Nov 1995.

Since then, seven civil society organisations plus five intergovernmental organisations have joined together to form the 12-member Steering Committee of the Coalition.

The seven civil society representatives are selected by their regional peers to achieve balance from South and South-East Asia and the Pacific, West and Central Africa, East and Southern Africa, North Africa and the Near East, Central and Latin America, the Caribbean, and the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD).

The five intergovernmental organisations are IFAD, the Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO), the World Food Programme (WFP), the World Bank and the European Commission.

The Popular Coalition itself is a “global consortium” of intergovernmental, civil society and bilateral organisations committed to the empowerment of the rural poor.

The Coalition aims at building alliances among diverse development organisations, placing particular emphasis on the role of civil society in overcoming hunger and poverty.

Moore said, while the global focal point was located at IFAD in Rome, the programme of work was undertaken by geographical nodes, which provide the decentralised means for participation and grassroots operation.

The Programme of Action of the Popular Coalition called for the creation of a major network on agrarian reform to strengthen the capacity of civil society, in particular the rural poor, to participate actively in the reform process by providing them with relevant knowledge and assistance.

This initiative is predicated on the recognition that the information gap between communities, countries and regions is one of the principal constraints to improved access to land and other productive assets, poverty eradication and rural development.

Marginalised rural communities frequently lack access to information and knowledge on the experience of other communities that have overcome similar or related problems.

Moore said, the ARNet (www.ifad.org/arnet) programme helped bridge the divide that separates communities and civil society from the information they need.

Phase I of the ARNet programme generated a range of results and outputs. This included production of eight regional and 23 national profiles on land reform issues and related civil society initiatives as a baseline reference source for the subsequent planning and implementation of country and regional level activities.

Moore said the Phase II activities included the collection, analysis and dissemination of relevant information, experience and knowledge from civil society organisations to civil society in order to strengthen their organisational capacities and lead to a stronger basis on which to participate in the policy-making process.

The Popular Coalition has also created a Community Empowerment Facility with initial support from IFAD and the World Bank, says a report made available to IPS this week.

Its objective is to strengthen the ability of the poor, especially women and indigenous peoples, to achieve secure access to land, including common property, water and associated support services.

The facility is also intended to promote community participation in policy dialogue and representation in local governance, strengthen agrarian institutions, enable conflict resolution and disseminate best practices and lessons learned.

Moore said the Popular Coalition was examining the constraints encountered by the rural poor in accessing commercial credit in order to identify and promote the financial services needed for sustainable agrarian reforms.

This would include overcoming the perceived risk of an unfamiliar rural clientele, the need for collateral and high transaction costs.

Tenurial security and property rights are key incentives to land improvement and sustainable practices in natural resource management.

Moore said he expects ARNet and the Community Empowerment Facility to assist in the planning and implementation of national action programmes to combat desertification by helping civil society and governments address the land tenure requirements.