This briefing explains how host government agencies involved in investment processes can effectively apply FPIC to:

1. Facilitate the right kind of investments, which operate responsibly and support sustainable development

2. Increase business confidence by fostering a stable and participatory investment environment

3. Comply with international law and align approval processes with industry standards and best practices

4. Avoid and mitigate financial, political, and legal risks

In this paper, we use an actor-oriented perspective to explore the nature and extent of conflict and negotiation with regard to land use and tenure among the Iban of Sarawak. The Iban are shifting cultivators who have long been involved in smallholder cash crops.

As gold prices soared from 2008 onwards, tens of thousands of foreign miners, especially from China, entered the small-scale mining sector in Ghana, despite it being ‘reserved for Ghanaian citizens’ by law. A free-for-all ensued in which Ghanaian and Chinese miners engaged in both contestation and collaboration over access to gold, a situation described as ‘out of control’ and a ‘culture of impunity’. Where was the state? This paper addresses the question of how and why pervasive and illicit foreign involvement occurred without earlier state intervention.

A major investigation by Global Witness has revealed how Cambodia’s ruling family are pulling the strings on Cambodia’s economy and amassing vast personal fortunes with extreme consequences for the population. The report, Hostile Takeover, sheds light on a huge network of secret deal-making and corruption that has underpinned Hun Sen’s 30-year dictatorial reign of murder, torture and the imprisonment of his political opponents.

ABSTRACTED FROM EXECUTIVE SUMMARY:

In 2018, the ruling People’s Action Party (PAP) managed to designate a future prime minister, Heng Swee Keat. He is likely to take the place of current Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong after the next parliamentary elections, which have to take place at the latest by January 15, 2021. Heng is viewed as a safe choice, who has a long and balanced career in the ruling party. He will face many challenges as the first leader in the post-Lee era, such as increasing political demands, geopolitical changes and economic problems.

In the six months since the coronavirus began its global spread, more than 15 million people have been diagnosed with COVID-19 and more than 600,000 have perished, causing governments around the world to institute lockdowns and shut down businesses while entire industries have been devastated.

Brunei Darussalam strives to build on its Millennium Development Goals achievements to take greater strides towards the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development and the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs).

A guide to tenure and foreign ownership to support property investment

The period under review covers 20 months under a coalition government, a constitutional crisis and a few months when the president and the prime minister, leading different political parties, jockeyed for position. There was little political progress under the coalition government. The Office of Missing Persons was set up to investigate extra-legal disappearances and initiated some investigations. Parliament approved legislation to set up the Office of Reparations, but this is yet to be operationalized.

This paper is an abridged version of an earlier scoping study entitled Sri Lanka Country Report: Land Watch Asia Study prepared in 2010 by the Sarvodaya Shramadana Movement through the support of the International Land Coalition (ILC). It is also written as a contribution to the Land Watch Asia (LWA) campaign to ensure that access to land, agrarian reform and sustainable development for the rural poor are addressed in development.

The report answers the following questions:

1. Is perpetual fee simple ownership of real property permitted? If not, what are the principal forms of ownership, or other principal form of ownership, of real property?

2. What instruments are used to convey fee simple ownership, or other principal form of ownership, of real estate?

3. How in this jurisdiction is the ownership of real property recorded or searched? Who generally performs the search? 

Driving Dispossession: The Global Push to “Unlock the Economic Potential of Land,” sounds the alarm on the unprecedented wave of privatization of natural resources that is underway around the world. Through six case studies — Ukraine, Zambia, Myanmar, Papua New Guinea, Sri Lanka, and Brazil — the report details the myriad ways by which governments — willingly or under the pressure of financial institutions and Western donor agencies — are putting more land into so-called “productive use” in the name of development.