By Abisola Adekoya
In a much anticipated United Nations Committee on Food Security meeting last week, officials failed to endorse a code of conduct on foreign land investments, claiming that existing rights to land should be respected. The code of conduct, or seven principles for “responsible agricultural investments,” were developed by the World Bank and the United Nations in response to concerns that recent accusations of large swaths of land, or “land grabs,” in Africa and Asia violated the rights of smallholder farmers and failed to give them adequate compensation.
The code of conduct was drawn up after international food and fuel prices spiked in 2007-08 and food-importing countries, such as China, Egypt and South Africa, sought to increase their food supplies and protect themselves from price volatility by acquiring land from the less developed world. (Photo credit: Bernard Pollack)
The code of conduct was drawn up after international food and fuel prices spiked in 2007-08 and food-importing countries, such as China, Egypt and South Africa, sought to increase their food supplies and protect themselves from price volatility by acquiring land from the less developed world. According to many NGOs, including The Oakland Institute and GRAIN, such deals come at the expense of smallholder farmers in African and Asian countries and could end up worsening poverty and hunger.
See Andrew Rice’s chapter entitled “Investing in Africa’s Land: Crisis and Opportunity.” In State of the World 2011: Innovations that Nourish the Planet, for more on land grabs in Africa.
For more NtP blog posts on “land grabbing” in the developing world, see: Creating Food Sovereignty for Small-Scale Farmers, Change is Possible in this Complex Food System, Large Scale Land Investments Do Not Benefit Local Communities.
