3 research outputs found
Livelihoods and coping strategies of local communities on previous customary land in limbo of commercial agricultural development: Lessons from the farm block program in Zambia
The surge in large-scale land acquisitions (LSLAs) has captured the attention of activists, development practitioners, policy makers and academics. Supported for food security, biofuels, financial investments, eco-tourism etc., opponents of LSLAs raise concerns regarding the fate of local communities suffering from (potential) land dispossession and involuntary displacements, environmental degradation, diminished local food security and sovereignty and casualisation of farm workers. Scholarly efforts to understand socio-economic and environmental impacts of LSLAs grapple with: (i) methodological challenges related to lack of (reliable) baseline data; and (ii) implementation of LSLA deals - LSLAs can be complex operations; cancelled or abandoned, and reshaped by diverse biophysical, socio-cultural and political landscapes in which they unfold. Few attempts have been made to understand how local communities cope with failed LSLA deals. Addressing this gap, this paper uses participatory rural appraisal methods to examine coping strategies of local communities in Nansanga farm block, a government of Zambia-led LSLA program. Overall, our fieldwork shows Nansanga is a deal in limbo of development: state-funded infrastructure has crumbled, and many private investors have not developed the land they bought. Instead, mining and tobacco companies have emerged as important economic players, filling the development vacuum created by the government’s absence in Nansanga. As immigration for casual mining jobs increases, there is land dispossession in some places, and curtailed access to dambos that used to be communal under customary land tenure. Our findings question the possibility of LSLA deals to contribute to wealth creation for local people. Our findings suggest pre-existing socio-economic status and household labour are key to understanding coping strategies of local people in Nansanga. High wealth households are more likely to take advantage of emerging opportunities from (failed) LSLA deals than low wealth households. Finally, LSLA deals transform resource use and therefore livelihoods - reinforcing pre-existing socio-economic community conditions.<br/
'When the cat is away, the mice will play':the political ecology of tobacco production and manganese mining in Nansanga farm block in Zambia
Understanding socio-economic and environmental impacts of large scale land acquisitions in Zambia: a case study of Nansanga farm block
The surge in large-scale land acquisitions (LSLAs) in the global
south has captured the attention of activists, development
practitioners, policy makers and academics. Whilst proponents of LSLAs
speak of opportunities to provide food security, biofuels, eco-tourism
etc., opponents have mainly been concerned with the fate of local
communities. A growing number of studies show that local communities
can (potentially) suffer from land dispossession and involuntary
displacements, environmental degradation, diminished local food security
and sovereignty, casualisation of job opportunities and curtailed access
to water resources. But there is more to LSLAs than these starkly
opposing claims; LSLAs can be lengthy and complex operations,
cancelled, slowed down or reshaped by diverse, socio-cultural, political
and biophysical landscapes in which they unfold.
The polarised claims about LSLA deals are based on political,
socio-economic and environmental (SEE) dimensions and footprints of
the phenomenon. In light of the polarised claims and the socio-cultural,
political and biophysical landscapes in which LSLA deals unfold, the aim
of this thesis is to understand the SEE impacts of LSLA deals in Zambia,
taking Nansanga farm block as a case study.
Nansanga farm block is part of the government of Zambia’s 2002
parliamentary decree agricultural program to establish nine farm blocks in
each of the then nine provinces. Nansanga farm block, established
among the Lala people in Senior Chief Muchinda, is the most developed
of the planned nine farm blocks. The farm block is established on 155
000 ha of wet miombo woodland in central province. The land tenure had
to be converted from customary to leasehold to pave the way for
investments by urbanites and foreigners.
Understanding SEE impacts of LSLAs has been marred by
methodological and epistemological challenges. These challenges are
linked to the evolution of LSLA deals; they are punctuated with cases of
scaling down production levels, cancellations, and abandonments or
transformations of business investment models. Investors can change, for
example, from production of biofuels to food crops or mining. Such
changes trigger different intended and non-intended consequences. In
addition, LSLAs are an incipient phenomenon whose impacts are difficult
to grasp without (reliable) baseline information on the affected areas and
communities. In the absence of baselines, studies to assess short to
medium term outcomes are difficult to interpret.
Taking Nansanga farm block as a case study contributes to the
post 2013 LSLA research agenda that has called for a shift in attention
from quantifying ‘grabbed’ hectares of land and naming ‘land grabbers’ to
learning about the processes and impacts of land deals where they
happen. Thus, context-specific understandings of SEE impacts become
important to assess vulnerabilities to external influences, as well as
benefits and costs of LSLA deals in communities where they unfold.
To understand the SEE impacts at community level, I used mixed
methods. Ethnographically, I engaged with communities in Nansanga as
‘experts’ of their own experience of the farm block in their environment. I
learned from them. To understand the SEE impacts, the methods were
largely informed by rural participatory appraisal approaches. The
empirical data presented in this thesis, are therefore, ‘co-produced
knowledge’ with community members.
In terms of structure, the thesis is divided into four general parts:
setting thesis stage and study site (Chapters 1 – 3); literature review
(Chapter 4); empirical chapters (Chapters 5 – 7); and the synthesis and
conclusion (Chapter 8). The thesis presents results on four aspects of
LSLAs. First, it proposes a conceptual framework to improve our
understanding of LSLAs (Chapter 4). Second, the thesis presents results
on the role of formal and informal institutions in shaping LSLA deals and
their outcomes (Chapter 5). Third, in Chapter 6, I present results on the
political ecology of LSLA deals in limbo of development. Fourth, Chapter
7 is focused on understanding how communities cope with impacts of
LSLA deals in limbo of development. In Chapter 8, I synthesise the key
findings from the thesis before concluding with a reflection on how the
findings relate to the broader scholarship on LSLAs, the general agrarian
and development questions that the findings raise.
Overall, the thesis has contributed to understanding the SEE
impacts of LSLA deals in limbo of development in a country that is a
target for LSLAs. In the absence of baselines, the thesis has looked at
the biophysical and socio-cultural uses of the miombo woodland where
Nansanga farm block has been established, thereby developing an
ecological and socio-cultural perspective and boundary that highlights a
research path for understanding impacts later in Nansanga. The thesis
has also looked at institutional environment of Zambia as a host country,
the political ecology of ‘failed’ LSLA deals and how affected communities
cope with unfulfilled promises of LSLA deals