I’ve spent a lot of time with indigenous peoples in remote places. So when I argue that the best way – or at least the cheapest way – to stop climate change is to grant land rights to indigenous communities, you might suspect I’m not coming from an entirely objective viewpoint. You’ve probably also heard various industry spokespeople saying the best and cheapest way to stop climate change is through windfarms, solar panels, electric cars and cavity wall insulation. But while I may be biased, and may even have “gone native” now and then, I’m not trying to sell you anything.

Just after nine o’clock on a Tuesday morning in June, an environmental activist named Bill Kayong was shot and killed while sitting in his pickup truck, waiting for a traffic light to change in the Malaysian city of Miri, on the island of Borneo. Kayong had been working with a group of villagers who were trying to reclaim land that the local government had transferred to a Malaysian palm-oil company.

By:Sophie Mbugua

Date: 8 December 2016

Source: Thomson Reuters Foundation

WITU, Kenya (Thomson Reuters Foundation) - Too poor to buy land where they grew up on Kenya's palm-fringed southern coast, Sylvester Jefua and his wife migrated 300 kms northwards to Witu Forest, where they felled seven acres of trees and built a mud and thatch house for their family.

Ten years later, Jefua, 36, still does not feel secure.

Date: 9 December 2016

Source:NewVision

In many of the landing sites such as Nangoma, Bulebi, Kiziru and others, residents are not allowed to re-build their grass-thatched houses for fear that they will catch fire and cause further destruction but they do not offer them any other option of accommodation other than leaving the landing site.

Date: 9 December 2016

Source:Coastweek

NAKURU (Xinhua) -- Access to land as a resource for development among widows in Kenya is a distressing issue of discussion despite the laws protecting their rights to land.

The Constitution outlaws violation of an individual’s right to land or property on basis of gender while Matrimonial Property Act clearly stretches out justice to a woman denied access and enjoyment of the respective assets.

Date: 8 December 2016

Source: UN News Centre

With millions of Colombian farmers affected by the violent conflict that plagued the Latin American country for more than 50 years, the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) will support a comprehensive rural reform strategy, aimed at strengthening food security and peace, including measures which address issues of land access and restitution.

Date: December 6, 2016

Source: Land Rights Now

“We live right next to the plantation and the guards are always passing the house. They shout at us, they scare the children, they insult me and threaten that they will shoot me. The children don’t want to go to school any more. They threw tear gas at us once when I was pregnant.”

By: Ernest Scheyder and Valerie Volcovici

Date: December 5, 2016

Source: Thomson Reuters Foundation

The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers said on Sunday it turned down a permit for a controversial pipeline project running through North Dakota, in a victory for Native Americans and climate activists who have protested against the project for months.

By: Paola Totaro

Date: December 6, 2016

Source: Thomson Reuters Foundation

LONDON (Thomson Reuters Foundation) - About a quarter of homeowners in India, and nearly one in five rural landowners, fear losing their property, in most cases because they do not have documents to prove ownership, according to a new poll.

By: Rina Chandran

Date: December 5, 2016

Source: Thomon Reuters Foundation

MUMBAI (Thomson Reuters Foundation) - Bhupendra Vira, an activist who tried to expose political links to illegal land dealings in Mumbai, was watching television at his suburban home one evening in October when he was shot dead.