Land and Power The growing scandal surrounding the new wave of investments in land (Oxfam Briefing Paper)

227 million hectares are reported to have been acquired since 2001, an area of land the size of North-Western Europe. Source: Land Matrix Partnership

History warns that any change in land relations is likely to be affected by systemic gender discrimination and that there is no a priori reason to assume that changes [induced by the new commercial pressures on land] will be any different. -Elizabeth Daley (2011) ‘Gendered impacts of commercial pressures on land’, ILC/CIRAD/Mokoro28

All our plantations were cut down – we lost the banana and cassava. We lost everything we had. The company’s casual labourers would attack us – they beat and threatened people. Even now they won’t let us back in to look for the things we left behind. I was threatened – they told me they were going to beat me if we didn’t leave. -Christine, mid-40s, previously of Kayindiyindi village, Kiboga district, Uganda

Clearly, it is the interests of the company to develop the agro-fuel project that prevail, rather than the Q’eqchi peasant families living in the area.
– Daniel Pascual, Comité de Unidad Campesina

The details of these big land acquisitions are often shrouded in secrecy, particularly the really big ones, which seem to be negotiated at a very high level.
Esther Obaikol, Executive Director, Uganda Land Alliance

Any land which increases in value gets taken out of the hands of the poor. – Fernando Eguren, CEPES, Peru