The push to turn commercial large-scale agricultural into a driving engine of the Zambian economy, in a situation where the protection of access to land is weak, can risk pushing small-holder farmers and peasants off their land and out of production with severe impacts on the people’s right to food,” Ms. Elver said at the end of her first official visit to the country

According to the current land utilization, about 11 million hectares or 16% of the total land area is under cultivation. Since a total of about 18 million hectares is estimated as suitable for agricultural purposes, some 7 million hectares of new land can be brought under crop cultivation and livestock farming. In bringing new land under agricultural use, it is important that the use of scientific techniques of land evaluation and land use planning be made mandatory to ensure the suitability and optimum use of land.

This article examines unusual features of various religious buildings located at Pagan, such as below-ground monasteries and brick-lined water-catchment basins, to establish that low rainfall of less than 24 inches annually was a constant in the local climate throughout the Pagan period. Confirming this fact sheds light on the critical role the construction of religious structures played in linking the inadequately watered capital to outlying irrigated agricultural lands, thus ensuring the necessary provision of food to the city.

As Myanmar’s junta prepared to step down from government, the military set about seizing public assets and natural resources to ensure its economic control in a new era of democratic rule.

Guns, Cronies and Crops details the collusion at the heart of operations carried out by Myanmar’s armed forces in northeastern Shan State. Large swathes of land were taken from farming communities in the mid-2000s and handed to companies and political associates to develop rubber plantations.

Land grabs demonstrate disconnect between development discourse and practice:

...Beginning in December 2010, Burmese Navy Unit No. 43, under the
command of Ka Dike-based government navy regional command head
quarters, began to confiscate the rubber plantations and household plots of
villagers on Kywe Thone Nyi Ma Island, Yebyu Township, Tennaserim
Division. Since then, all land on which red signboards were placed by the
navy has been confiscated. This report documents the confiscation of over
1,000 acres of land on Kywe Thone Nyi Ma Island. However, HURFOM found

Northern Burma’s borderlands have undergone dramatic changes in the last two decades. Three main and
interconnected developments are simultaneously taking place in Shan State and Kachin State: (1) the increase
in opium cultivation in Burma since 2006 after a decade of steady decline; (2) the increase at about the same
time in Chinese agricultural investments in northern Burma under China’s opium substitution programme,
especially in rubber; and (3) the related increase in dispossession of local communities’ land and livelihoods

This report includes a situation update submitted to KHRG in April 2011 by a villager describing events occurring in Te Naw Th'Ri Township, Tenasserim Division between June 2010 and April 2011. The report details abuses related to land confiscation by Union Solidarity and Development Party (USDP) officials; forced labour, including forced USDP membership; and attacks on villages in hiding, including the burning of houses, food stores, a school dormitory and supplies by Tatmadaw forces.

MAE SOT, Thailand - "The conflict-ridden Thai-Myanmar border has long been associated with drug smuggling, arms-dealing and human trafficking and other illicit trades. Now a new investment initiative aims to bring bilateral border trade above ground through the establishment of export-oriented special economic zones (SEZs) in the two countries' hinterlands.

The two sides agreed last month in Mandalay to finalize a long pending agreement, which in the first phases will open the way for

A global coalition of 14 Partners and over 120 international, regional and community organizations advancing forest tenure, policy, and market reforms.....

Core Beliefs:

"Based on our experience, we find that empowerment of rural people and asset-based development are part of a process that is dependent on a set of enabling conditions, including security of tenure to access and use natural resources. As a coalition of diverse and varied organizations, RRI is guided by a set of core beliefs...

Rights of Poor Communities Must Be Recognized and Strengthened:

Several articles on land grabbing in Burma/Myanmar

The current reforms in Burma/Myanmar are worsening land grabs in the country. Since the mid-2000s there has been a spike in land grabs, especially leading up to the 2010 national elections. Military and government authorities have been granting large-scale land concessions to well-connected Burmese companies.