IMPROVED LAND GOVERNANCE

Weak land governance and insecure land rights are still major development challenges for Africa. Loss of land due to climate change (in the form of erosion), as well as large-scale land acquisitions have increased pressure on agricultural land.

While many African countries have shown the political will to pursue these initiatives, their implementation at country level remains at an early stage. Many of them lack the human and institutional advisory capacities required to implement sustainable land policies. Implemented in cooperation with the World Bank and the African Union’s Land Policy Initiative (LPI), the ONE World No Hunger global program SLGA („Strengthen Land Governance in Africa“) aims to strengthen African institution with the implementation of improved land policies. It focusses on marginalized groups, such as small farmers, women and ethnic minorities.
By strengthening individual and institutional capacities on a continental and regional level, as well as in the AU member states, SLGA strengthens the human and institutional capacities for the implementation of sustainable and development-orientated land policy in Africa.

The four fields of action

1. Strengthen training and education capacities
2. Establish an African Network of Excellence on Land Governance (NELGA)
3. Strengthen practice-oriented research
4. Strengthen AU institutions to implement the AU agenda on land

SLGA focusses on establishing NELGA. The network of excellence includes selected African universities and research institutes that play a leading and successful role in academic education, training and research in the field of land governance. NELGA cooperates with relevant African and international research networks and advisors on sustainable land governance. DAAD (German Academic Exchange Service) supports NELGA with about 250 scholarships for doctoral and masters students as well as scholarship programs for research projects, postgraduate funding and network building.