Harry Jonas (Natural Justice) worked with Lanash Thanda and Alice Matthew (Borneo Conservancy) from 8-10 February to facilitate a workshop in Melangkap, a cluster of villages in Sabah, Malaysia, to begin to explore the communities' futures. The participants looked ahead to Melangkap in 2030 to think through what might be the positive and negative changes, and to think through how to avoid the negative. The workshop and related meetings with the communities' Ketua Kampungs (leaders) constitute preparatory work ahead of assisting the communities to develop a community protocol and to engage external stakeholders. Monday, 11 February 2013
Harry Jonas (Natural Justice) worked with Lanash Thanda and Alice Matthew (Borneo Conservancy) from 8-10 February to facilitate a workshop in Melangkap, a cluster of villages in Sabah, Malaysia, to begin to explore the communities' futures. The participants looked ahead to Melangkap in 2030 to think through what might be the positive and negative changes, and to think through how to avoid the negative. The workshop and related meetings with the communities' Ketua Kampungs (leaders) constitute preparatory work ahead of assisting the communities to develop a community protocol and to engage external stakeholders.  |
| Photo via www.facebook.com/pages/Kenweb |
In a significant victory for community land rights, the Kenyan High Court Judge Mumbi Ngugi has ruled that all land use plans for the Tana River Delta must be developed with the full participation of local communities. The Court also ordered that the Tana and Athi Rivers Development Authority must share current short and long term land use plans and that plans will be periodically reviewed. The ruling is a major triumph as tens of thousands of hectares of multi-use floodplain would have been converted for sugar cane production under the current plan and many residents of the Delta were to be removed.
The case was brought by representatives of farmers, fishermen, pastoralists and conservation groups in the Tana River Delta and sought to halt large-scale commercial developments in the Tana River Delta until a master plan was developed. They were supported by the Kenya Wetlands Biodiversity Research Team with funding from the East African Wildlife Society and Nature Kenya.
Saturday, 9 February 2013
The Compliance Advisor Ombudsman (CAO), the independent recourse mechanism of the International Finance Corporation (IFC), has released an audit of the IFC’s financial sector investments together with a response from the IFC. The audit considered 188 of the IFC’s 844 financial sector investments and has revealed significant risks from these investments as they potentially cause environmental and/or social harm. The audit determines that while the IFC has followed its environmental and social policy and procedural requirements, the methodology does not determine whether environmental and social management systems in place by clients actually fulfil the ‘do no harm’ objective. Further, CAO questions whether IFC’s procedures support broader social and environmental outcomes “commensurate with IFC’s prominent leadership role as a promoter of environmental and social responsibility.”
The full audit can be accessed here.
The Indigenous Peoples’ and Community Conserved Areas and Territories (ICCA) Consortium has released the third edition of its newsletter, which focuses on Consortium events and activities from the final months of 2012. The newsletter blends coverage of work at the international and regional level with activities in specific countries and locations. The newsletter highlights the continued emergence of the ICCA Consortium, especially at the 11th Conference of Parties to the Convention on Biological Diversity, as an influential actor representing various coalition partners supporting ICCAs. The steady expansion of national-level work from supporting individual ICCAs to developing nation-wide coalitions is also emphasised. Finally, the success of Consortium members in forcing policy conversations on conservation to always consider ICCAs, something unimaginable 10 years ago, is underscored. The newsletter can be downloaded here.
Friday, 8 February 2013
Ainsi, les communautés ont pu utiliser les PBCs pour assurer le renforcement des institutions coutumières et des organisations communautaires au Ghana ; la cartographie communautaire et la documentation des modes de vie traditionnels en Malaisie ; la mobilisation de diverses communautés en réponse à une menace commune au Kenya ; le renforcement juridique des petits agriculteurs biologiques et le plaidoyer pour les droits des éleveurs en Inde ; ou encore pour dialoguer avec les entreprises responsables pour soutenir les moyens de subsistance locaux en Afrique du Sud.
Le prospectus sur les PBCs est disponible en français ici.
Thursday, 7 February 2013
The team from the Law, Environment and Design (LED) Lab, a new partnership between Natural Justice and the Srishti School of Art, Design and Technology, visited three villages in the core area of the Sariska Tiger Reserve to begin a resource mapping process with the Gujjar community. The team was accompanied by KRAPAVIS, a local NGO. The team worked with the community on a cognitive mapping exercise where different groups gathered to fill the chart paper with their understanding of the space they lived in. These cognitive maps became an effective tool to document the injustices caused by the denial of their rights to access the forest after its declaration as a tiger reserve. The LED Lab team conducted meetings with the Gram Sabha in each village to understand the status of implementation of the Forest Rights Act, 2006 and through this determined that knowledge of the Act was limited. The design students accordingly decided to develop a graphic novel that chronicles the different provisions of the Act and describes its interaction with potentially conflicting laws like the Wildlife Protection Act, 1972. The team also visited relocated villages where communities are still struggling with the dramatic transition and heard of the lack of community consultation through the relocation process. The LED team will now work towards creating a simple relocation chart that will detail options available along with experiences and challenges faced by other villages.
Tuesday, 5 February 2013
The Rights and Resources Initiative has released two ground-breaking reports highlighting the importance of secure land tenure in broader national and international law and policy and for investors. “Landowners or Laborers: What choice will developing countries make?” considers the implications of policies, especially in Africa, that seek rapid development by ceding control of land and resources to external actors. It contrasts these policies with the successes of China and Brazil, which have achieved advances through establishing local property rights rather than undercutting them. It further summarises the state of resources and rights globally, and identifies the key choices and challenges faced by developing countries in 2012. The report can be downloaded here.
“The Financial Risks of Insecure Land Tenure: An Investment View” considers the assumption that cheap land can be acquired to derive high profits easily. The report challenges this view, arguing that exploiting land with disputed tenure rights leads to significant risks. The paper can be downloaded here.
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