Global Campaign for Agrarian Reform

Working document: Commentary on land and rural

development policies of the World Bank

FIAN (Food First Information andAction Network): For the HumanRight to Feed Oneself

La Via Campesina: For the right toproduce and for food sovereignty

Table of contents

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1. Introduction 3

2. Reaching the Poor: the new strategy for rural development 3

3. Land Policies for Growth and Poverty Reduction: the Land Policy Research Report 4

4. Growth: always in first place 4

5. Land privatization 6

6. Land rental markets: the new panacea 7

7. The failure of the market-assisted land reform 8

8. Pacification for the stability of investments? 9

9. The Global Campaign for Agrarian Reform and the World Bank 9

On October 2002 the World Bank board of executivedirectors approved a new rural development strategyReaching the Poor. In addition the Bank published inMay 2003 its Land Policy Research Report- Land Policiesfor Growth and Poverty Reduction.These two documents will have a powerful influenceover the definition of land and rural future domesticdevelopment policies, as well as over internationaldevelopment aid policies in this field. Hardly any otherinternational organization is prepared to impose itsagenda in such an aggressive and systematic way as theWorld Bank. While the World Trade Organization, theWTO, is the focal point of protest, the Bank’s perfor-mance has not caused the same spark of massive socialdemonstration. This is amazing taking into account thatthe Bank has paved the way for the WTO (land controlis central for agro industrial, forest, mining, water, bio-diversity and infrastructure investment) and has interve-ned in decision making in such an anti democratic waythat has led great sectors of rural populations from allover the world into hunger and poverty.

The policies that the aforementioned documents assu-me will deepen the process of land privatization andcontinue impoverishing and depriving women and ruralcommunities of their means of life. In this documentGlobal Campaign for Agrarian Reform, promoted byFIAN and La Vía Campesina, is presenting a criticalanalysis of the new policies. For many years we havebeen denouncing the harmful effects of land policiesand rural development that the World Bank has causedin the living conditions of poor and landless peasantfamilies from many Southern countries. This documentpresents then, the point of view of those who have beenharmed and of their organizations, which rarely receiveattention at a domestic level, let alone at an internatio-nal level.

First we will present a brief summary of both docu-ments. Then, we will analyze certain aspects of its con-tent that we consider important, and finally we willmake some observations regarding the way the Bankconducted the preparation of these documents.

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1. Introduction

2. Reaching the Poor: the new strategy for rural development

Taking into account that at an international level almost75% of people living in poverty are found in rural areas,and that the resources allocated for agriculture havedecreased dramatically, the Bank states that its initiativein rural development has been very poor so far (theamount of its investments for rural development onlyreaches 25% of the total amount of allocated resources).The principal objective of the new strategy is to givemore relevance to rural development within the Bankactivities. The Bank starts from the assumption thatagriculture is the main source of rural economic growthin the poorest countries, and that agricultural growth isthe best way to reduce rural poverty. The Bank openlyclaims that the productivity increase and economicalgrowth are the central focal points of the new strategy.The new strategy of rural development adopts the basicprinciples of structural adjustment (such as the liberali-zation of agricultural markets, the strengthening of pri-vate companies, and privatization of sectors that are stillin the hands of the State). At the same time, the stra-tegy tries to respond to the main contextual changessuch as the globalization of food markets, progress inscientific and technical fields, increasing urbanization,

climatic changes and environmental degradation. Insimple words, the new strategy tries to promote agri-cultural growth using the following policies: liberaliza-tion of agricultural markets and complete inclusion ofagriculture in multilateral trade agreements, support forinvestment in science and technology, especially bio-technology, support for diversification of export agricul-ture to satisfy the increasing demand of global foodmarkets, increase of efficiency in the use of water by rai-sing prices, privatization of rural extension services andsupport for the construction of a rural infrastructure.

On the sidelines of these core policies, the Bank formu-lates some measures to mitigate the vulnerability of therural population and to improve its welfare. Amongthose the following ones stand out: the need to impro-ve diets and fight against micronutrient deficiencies, theimprovement of social safety nets, prioritizing of thefight against HIV/AIDS and universal primary education.Regarding the conservation of natural resources, thisstrategy promotes the improvement of the use of theseresources in order to increase agricultural productivity.

The Land Policy Research Report (LPRR) emphasizes theimportance of land as a key resource for poor rural peo-ple, for economic growth, and for the operation of themarket and other social institutions. The LPRR intendsto increase the effectiveness of land policies in thedevelopment and reduction of poverty. With this pur-pose, the LPRR presents the most recent researchresults about land policies so that they may be used asa guide for policy formulation.

The LPRR is organized in three parts: property rightsand land tenure security, land markets, in particular landrental markets, land use and the government’s role. Security of property rights is considered a measure thatcan improve the welfare of the poorest (including tradi-tionally discriminated groups such as women), sinceland is their main way to make a living. At the sametime, land tenure security is considered a key factor foreconomic growth since it promotes investment, impro-ves loan access, and favors the transfer of land to impro-ve the efficiency of land allocation, and contributes tothe development of financial markets. The LPRR alsoemphasizes the impacts of land tenure security in theresolution of land disputes, as well, as in the govern-ment capabilities and the empowerment of marginalgroups.

Market land transactions are considered importantmechanisms to give land to both landless workers and

to those without enough land, as well as to developfinancial markets using land as collateral. Land rentalmarkets are said to characteristically have lower tran-saction costs; moreover, leasing land is considered abetter option than selling land insofar as it is a more fle-xible and versatile way to transfer land from the leastefficient producers to the most efficient.

Regarding the role of government, the LPRR assumesthat decentralized transactions based on guaranteedproperty rights are more likely to increase efficiency andequity of governments’ intervention otherwise inclinedto corruption. Governments’ role then should be limitedto establish the legal and institution framework in whichland markets can function and to create the macroeco-nomic context in which transactions that increase pro-ductivity may be rewarded. However, given the unfairdistribution of land property, and the insufficient use ofproductive land in many countries, it is necessary thatgovernments start redistributive reforms. On the otherhand, in order to promote the use of land to maximizesocial welfare, governments should appeal to fiscalmeasures more than to regulative norms.

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3. Land Policies for Growth and Poverty Reduction: the Land Policy Research Report

4. Growth: always in first place

Growth and poverty reduction are terms that appear lin-ked throughout both documents. Both documentsmake claims such as “using economic growth in favor ofthe poor” and “putting the poor in position to benefitfrom economic growth” but it does not explain howsuch ideals could be achieved1. While the new policiesclearly and precisely design how to promote and pro-tect investments, trade and the private sector, the mea-sures adopted to reduce poverty are merely palliatives.

The new rural development strategy shows a clear pre-ference for transnational corporations, many of whichhave a long record of human rights violations in ruralcommunities and environmental pollution2. Palliativemeasures such as the recommended social security netsdo not comply with human rights standards, are far fromgiving solution to the structural causes of hunger andpoverty and have been used as political instruments3. It

is not out of the ordinary then that measures explicitlydesigned to give women and the poorest people accessto and control over productive resources (such as land,water and loans), are playing a marginal and ambiguousrole within the new strategy. This one takes for grantedthe success of land policies based on market mecha-nisms implemented so far by the Bank. The strategyadvocates for expanding these policies in the futuredespite evidences of their failure and harmful effects4. Inthis regard, both documents use their references topoor people and the reduction of poverty to justify eco-nomic policies while concealing the real beneficiaries ofthis growth.

The new strategy of rural development neither takesinto account the social causes of poverty, nor presentsproposals to help overcome social, economic, and poli-tical barriers that deprive the poorest rural population

of their livelihoods. On the contrary, this strategy advo-cates the strengthening of the already implementedliberalization and privatization policies which have hadharmful effects on living conditions of rural communi-ties. Exhaustive studies about the impacts of programsof structural adjustment – such as SAPRIN5 - developedwith the initial support of the Bank, reach the conclusionthat agricultural reform policies have exacerbated landinequalities: The promotion of agricultural exportations,the liberalization of imports, and the government’s with-drawal from the provision of extension services and sup-port to production, have benefited large scale produ-cers, and at the same time, have excluded and/or depri-ved the most marginalized groups of access to produc-tive resources such as land, loans etc. Small peasants’incomes have decreased, while the cost of agriculturalinputs and production has increased dramatically. Thesame way, physical and economical access to food hasworsened and food sovereignty has decreased due tohigh costs of production. Land sown with basic cropshas to leave room for export crops, which decreasesavailability of local food and increases dependence onimports. The decrease in income and the increase offood prices show that, under these conditions, access tofood through the market is pure illusion. The effects ofthese policies have been particularly negative forwomen farmers since they have strengthened traditio-nal discrimination against women’s access to and con-trol over productive resources. Finally, favouring intensi-ve farming for export, using chemical products, andconcentrating land tenure, have continued the processof degradation of the environment and biodiversity.

The new strategy for rural development will also bolsterthe increasing concentration of the world food system.Agricultural commodity chains - on both the input andoutput sides - have become increasingly concentratedin the hands of very few transnational corporations, whoby virtue of their near-monopoly status are increasinglysetting costs and prices unfavorable to farmers, puttingall, in an untenable cost-price squeeze, thus furtherencouraging a significant and continued deterioration inthe access of the poor to land and the abandonment ofagriculture6.

In this context, solutions that are based on technologi-cal progress only will only increase social exclusion inrural areas. The Green Revolution has shown that provi-ding new technologies does not solve social and eco-nomic exclusion of women and the poor, but tends tomake the existing inequalities deeper. Only those whocomply with specific requirements, such as, educationallevel and technical qualifications, enough economicalresources and other necessary conditions that soften

both the transition and the risks, can take advantage ofthe new technologies.

The new strategy emphasizes promoting biotechnology,and takes for granted an alleged consensus about thewillingness to foster this kind of technology. Given theclose relation between the Bank and biotechnologycompanies7, it is more than likely that the Bank will pro-mote GMO’s on a large scale, and will adopt a legal fra-mework to protect those interests. In fact, the Bank alre-ady has already approved $50 million in loans for agri-cultural biotechnology projects, which include GMOssuch as BT rice, BT cotton, and sweet potatoes8.

Taking into account that biotechnology and its applica-tions are practically monopolized by a few transnationalcorporations, which want to safeguard their exclusiveproperty rights to genetic resources, there is the immi-nent danger that these companies will leave peasantand indigenous communities without access to or con-trol over those genetic resources and will further con-centrate their productive resources9. On the other hand,the incalculable risks of genetic engineering for humanhealth and for sustainable biodiversity support the argu-ments in favor of taking precaution and giving priorityto other kinds of technology that have proved to beenvironmentally sustainable and more suited to theneeds of poor peasant families10.

Millions of peasants all over the world are firmly oppo-sed to GMOs for the aforementioned reasons11.Biotechnology will not put an end to hunger or ruralpoverty. On the contrary, it risks aggravating it12.

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The land tenure security needed by rural women andpoor people is not the same land tenure security that isdemanded by investors. The LPRR does not take intoaccount this difference but rather assumes that whate-ver might be convenient for investors is also convenientfor poor peasants.

The LPRR presents a concept of land tenure securitythat tends to limit it to the security of individual pro-perty rights. Property rights are understood from anevolutionary point of view, allegedly observed in thecourse of development in almost every part of theworld. According to this concept, the need to supportgrowing populations and to take advantage of econo-mical opportunities which arise in trade make it neces-sary to invest in land. The condition for such investmentis the protection of land and hence the need to secureproperty rights. Moreover, economic development willinvolve progress towards individualized property rightsas the most secure form of land tenure.

Policies of land administration (land registry, demarca-tion, entitlement, etc) that have been applied in recentyears under Bank sponsorship have not resulted in gre-ater security in land tenure for women and poor ruralcommunities. On the contrary, these policies have incre-ased their vulnerability to losing land. In order to pro-perly to understand the effects of the Bank’s policies ofland administration, it is necessary to analyze themtogether with sectoral agrarian and agricultural policiesand within a general macroeconomic context. What isobserved then is that the processes of entitling landtenure—in most cases individually— as well as liberali-zing agricultural trade and dismantling public services ofsupport for small and medium sized agricultural produ-cers began with the promise that that they would regu-late, formalize and secure land tenure. The bankruptcyof many peasants who were holding land title deeds,which were now transferable and could be seized, allo-wed banks to take possession of these lands. In othercases, conditions that were so adverse for peasantfamily economies, the impossibility of producing, andconcomitantly, the dramatic deterioration of living con-ditions, pushed many peasants towards selling theirland to large agro-export businessmen in order to have,for the moment, some money in their pockets. “Increasein allocation efficiency from the less efficient producersto the more efficient ones” is the technocratic languagethat the Bank uses to describe the deprivation of pea-sant families of their means of life.

The privatization of collective and communal forms ofland tenure and of rural extension services has negati-vely affected peasants and indigenous people, espe-cially in those countries where a considerable number of

them had benefited from past agrarian reforms.

Thus, when the cooperatives could no longer count onthe government’s support and the conditions of pro-duction were deteriorating significantly, the disputesover both female and male members’ rights on the coo-peratives worsened. Men claimed that women were notas productive due to maternity leaves and the care ofsick children, which makes women loose many workingdays. Facing these pressures many women, especiallysingle mothers, “voluntarily” abandoned the cooperati-ves13.

In the processes of privatization and division of land intoplots, women tended to be discriminated against inso-far as they received less land, and land of worse qualitythan their male coworkers from the cooperatives. Inother cases men intentionally excluded female mem-bers from deciding how to allocate the land and distri-buted the land among themselves. In the cases in whichonly men were members of the cooperative, womenwere unable to have any influence on the process andmen ended up selling off the land and keeping themoney for themselves. Many couples separated due tothese confrontations. The Mexican reform that openedup the possibility of privatizing “ejido” lands stands outas one of the most reactionary and harmful to women’sland rights14.

In the same way, the improved access to credit, the alle-ged benefit of land entitlement, is no more than an illu-sion for the poorest groups. Empirical studies show thatwith the given conditions land entitlement has increasedoffers of land credit to large-scale producers and thatthis effect could stimulate the concentration of land tothe detriment of small-scale peasant farmers15.

The LPRR avoids the systematic analysis of the causes ofland tenure insecurity for the poorest and for women:one of the most important causes is the lack of govern-mental protection against land grabbing by large landowners and speculators. Others are: the promotion ofagricultural exports and projects of intensive exploita-tion of natural resources (mining, tourism, industrial fis-hing, etc.), the weakness and partiality of the judiciarywhich tends to protect the investor’s interests and pri-vate property before it protects fundamental rights ofpoor rural communities, and forms of legal, institutional,cultural and structural discrimination against women. Anexhaustive analysis of all these aspects remains to bedone because the aim of this project is clear: to secureland security rights for investors.

In order to fulfill their commitments to human rights,governments should put into effect policies of land

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5. Land privatization

administration designed to strengthen control of maleand female peasants and indigenous people over pro-ductive resources (land, water, forests, biodiversity).These groups’ rights to land should be protectedagainst attacks from third parties who intend to takepossession of their land. Policies of land administrationneed to take into account historical grievances and res-tore the right to lands and territories of indigenous peo-ples and other rural populations who were deprived oftheir lands through racist and discriminatory policies.Land regularization cannot be used to legitimize land

robberies that occurred in the past. Governments havethe obligation to make their policies coherent so thatpolicies and norms for the use of lands, administrationof lands, rural investment, and trade, do not jeopardizethe most vulnerable groups’ control over productiveresources; on the contrary, governments have the obli-gation to strengthen this control by applying economicand sectoral policies that stimulate the peasant eco-nomy.

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6. Land rental markets: the new panacea

The LPRR emphatically recommends the implementa-tion of land rental policies. No doubt this policy hasbecome the new panacea, which is being promoted bythe Bank with the same fervor as the market-assistedland reform was promoted a few years back16.

The argument provided by the LPRR in favor of land ren-tal markets resembles the argument that grounded themarket-assisted land reform: leasing is a cheaper andmore flexible way of giving access to land to those wholack it since the money required for its purchase is nolonger needed.

Experiences of leasing are quite dissimilar in Africa,Latin America, and Asia. In these two last regions, lea-sing is historically associated with feudal relations bet-ween landlord and tenant. In this regard, appropriatequestions to be asked in specific cases are the followingones: do the social and political conditions exist thatenable land rental markets to provide, as in Europe,most of the rural populations with land? What condi-tions are necessary for poor and landless women toactually be able to lease land?

Land leasing is just a variant of market-assisted landreform, since both of them share the same fundamentalassumption: that it is possible to use the market toredistribute resources. As we pointed out earlier in ouranalysis on the willing-seller-willing-buyer model17, mar-ket-assisted land reform is not able to solve the problemof unequal land distribution, since the market is unableto redistribute resources in oligopolistic environments.No empirical evidence has been found that shows thatmarket-assisted land reform has fundamentally alteredunfair and highly concentrated structures of land tenu-re.

It is alarming to notice that the LPRR avoids any discus-sion of the conditions and regulations that would benecessary to allow poor people to benefit from land lea-sing and to avoid landlords’ exploitation of tenants. Onthe contrary, the LPRR advocates the removal, espe-cially in Asia, of the regulations that protect tenants,since they are said to be expensive, difficult to imple-ment and an obstruction to the market’s free develop-ment.

Egypt’s experience of the liberalization of the land ren-tal market should be taken as a warning: Until 1992access to land was regulated by the 1952 agrarianreform law that aimed to protect small-scale peasants.This law imposed maximum limits to land ownership, setland-renting prices, gave the tenants the right to inheritleasing contracts and made it difficult for landlords toevict their tenants. Within the framework of the nego-tiations on structural adjustment with both the WorldBank and the International Monetary Fund, the Egyptiangovernment adopted the 96/1992 land tenure reformlaw as one of the main reforms towards the liberalizationof its economy. This law invalidated every leasing con-tract of agricultural lands and prescribed that access toland should be controlled by market forces. The resultsof this change was immediately felt: leasing pricesincreased by approximately 300%. The exorbitant lea-sing prices deprived small-scale peasants of access toland since they could not afford those prices. In this con-text, the number of credit programs to ease the transi-tion has been insignificant, and has barely reached theminimum percentage of the affected population18. Theenforcement of this law was accompanied by great vio-lence on the part of the government authorities19.

One of the most notable results of the LPRR is that itacknowledges that the model of land redistributionthrough the market (this model has had different namessuch as market-assisted land reform, negotiated landreform, community-based land reform), failed inColombia and South Africa. This acknowledgment isvery relevant since, so far, the Bank has refused to ack-nowledge the existence of problems.

In 2001, Mr. Klaus Deininger, land policy officer of theWorld Bank, stated that pilot projects of market-assis-ted land reform were very successful in Colombia20. Inthe current LPRR these projects are not mentioned atall. On the contrary, the statement “all establishedfarms are unable to repay the debts” suggests that thepilot projects also failed. In the case of South Africa theLPRR acknowledges that during the first three years ofthe program (1994-1997), even though the goal was totransfer 99.07 million hectares corresponding to 30% ofagricultural land, only 200,000 hectares were transfe-rred.

The acknowledgment of the failure of market-assistedland reform model was restricted to Colombia andSouth Africa. Cases such as Guatemala, where the failu-re is also evident were not mentioned at all21. In contrastin Brazil this policy is considered giving positive results.The LPRR completely ignores the intense oppositionthat large sectors of the Brazilian agrarian reform move-ment have displayed against the market-assisted landreform model. In addition, the LPRR ignores a series ofanalyses and studies that show that the implementationof this model in Brazil suffers from problems similar tothose in other countries: inequality of parties involved inthe negotiations, ignorance of the conditions of the pro-gram, lack of legal and technical advice, politicalinfluence in the selection of the beneficiaries, incapacityof the beneficiaries to pay back their debts, land of badquality, corruption, etc22. The fact that the new Braziliangovernment, in January 2003, announced the suspen-sion of Banco da Terra—the name used for market-assis-ted land reform in Brazil—in order to examine accusa-tions of irregularities and corruption, as well as pro-blems of both infrastructure and the capacity to pay thebeneficiaries, is evidence for serious doubts about thesuccess of the market model.

The LPRR appears to accept that there is a range of pos-sibilities of land tenure reform including expropriation;however, this section’s conclusion is revealing, for itintends to hamper redistribution processes based onexpropriation: “ […] there are many land-related inter-ventions with a clear poverty-reducing impact that areless controversial politically and less demanding interms of institutional capacity and fiscal resources.

Initiating a program of land reform without at the sametime exhausting these other options will not be pru-dent” (xlvi). It cannot be denied that the application ofprograms of land reform based on expropriation and/ormaximum limits of land ownership suffers from deepshortcomings, which range from the lack of an institu-tional capacity to slowness and open corruption. Loyalto the neo-liberal belief that the state is corrupt andcannot be reformed, the Bank continues to apply thefollowing reasoning: if your head hurts, cut it off. If thestate fails, dismantle it. In this regard, the Bank is notinterested in discussing how to improve the state’s ins-truments of regulation and intervention that redistribu-te resources and guarantee a minimum standard ofliving for its citizens. The redistributive function of thestate is not accepted by the interests groups that con-trol the Bank’s activity, and in this regard, they do allthat is within their reach to terminate it.

The Global Campaign for Agrarian Reform has beenvehemently opposing the implementation of market-assisted land reform, since this policy does not ensurethe realization of a wide and integral agrarian reformthat guarantees the peasant’s right to access to landand productive resources. Market-led land reform poli-cies are unable to solve the problem of the unfair distri-bution of land since it is impossible to redistributeresources in oligopolistic contexts by means of marketmechanisms. Traditionally marginalized groups, espe-cially women among them, are excluded in advancefrom these programs since they do not satisfy the requi-rements. Moreover, it has been shown that women’scapacity to negotiate in land markets is lower thanmen’s and most often they are restricted to lots whichare of worse quality and more expensive. It is evidentthen that land markets are not neutral regarding gen-der23.

The international community and governments shouldacknowledge that market-assisted land reform (inclu-ding mechanisms such as land banks and land funds) areinadequate instruments in highly unequal societies, andtherefore, cannot replace agrarian reform processesthat expropriate large land owners, whose land oftenlies idle and does not fulfill any economic and socialfunction. Expropriations should be undertaken in strictaccordance with the rule of law and land given to thosewho lack it.

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7. The failure of market-assisted land reform

In the chapter on the reduction of the incidence andimpact of land conflicts, the LPRR deals with dimensionsof land issues that go beyond a mere economic pers-pective and that are fundamental to accounting for thecauses of poverty and the lack of means of life in ruralcommunities; in particular we are referring to historicalroots of land theft, unequal power relations, and injusti-ce. The LPRR points to the relation between the depri-vation of land rights and social conflicts which can esca-late into violent confrontation, with devastating conse-quences. In this way, the LPRR emphasizes the need toattend urgently to the following aspects of those kindsof conflictive situations: reinsertion of veterans, resettle-ment of refugees, attention to widows and orphans, andreconstruction of the social fabric at a local level. Theestablishment of a legal base to clarify rights to land ina clear, simple and effective way plays a crucial role.

It is highly important to continue developing this pers-pective which needs to be very carefully approached.The LPRR’s approach leaves the feeling that the primor-dial goal of policies regarding these issues is to appea-se the most explosive conflicts in order to create stableconditions for investment. The effort to seek the truth,creates justice, and rehabilitates victims for the dama-ges suffered (punishment of those responsible for cri-mes against humanity, return of stolen land, compensa-tion to women for sexual assault etc.) doesn’t appear inthe LPRR as the central axis on which to constructpeace. Here it becomes evident with great clarity thatthe LPRR does take into account the perspective ofhuman rights in addressing land disputes, and in parti-

cular, land policies in general24. It is scandalous that theWorld Bank ignores international human rights stan-dards which are binding for the governments responsi-ble for the Bank’s activities, and therefore for the Bankitself.

The LPRR only brushes the question of justice and une-qual power relations in the context of conflicts overland. Nevertheless this dimension is essential to unders-tanding the entire process of agrarian reform startingfrom its political formulation, going through the deci-sion making process right through to the implementa-tion. The LPRR then ignores a key development in agra-rian reform: the autonomous organization of the land-less and peasants movements as well as the high capa-city of mobilization of their members to struggle fortheir rights25. Only strong peasant movements thatunderstands its struggle as a struggle for citizenship anddemocratization can change the relations of social, poli-tical and gender forces, which are oppressive and depri-ve millions of people in rural areas of their livelihoods. Itis therefore highly important that civil and politicalrights (freedom of assembly, to organize, freedom ofexpression, of self determination) of workers and ruralpeasants. The LPRR is silent about one of the biggestobstacles to accomplishing agrarian reform, the crimi-nalization and the persecution of struggling peasants.To recognize and support the peasant organizations askey actors in the agrarian process is one of the funda-mental conditions for success.

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8. Pacification for the stability of investments?

9. The Global Campaign for Agrarian Reform and the World Bank

The Global Campaign for Agrarian Reform addressed aletter to Mr. James Wolfensohn, the President of theWorld Bank in April of 2002, where we expressed ourworries about the way in which the Bank was going toredefine its land policies by elaborating the LPRR thatwe are now dealing with. The Bank had announced thatthis process would be done in an open and transparentmanner and with the participation and consultation ofcivil society. During the first half of 2002 the Bank the-refore organized four regional workshops whose resultswere supposedly to be cited in the final LPRR. In our let-ter we observed however, that instead this process wascharacterized by a lack of transparency and by its exclu-sionary nature.

Some of the invited participants at the regional works-hop conducted in Kampala, Uganda in April-May 2002made a public announcement where they noted thatthere was practically no presence of those who wereaffected by the issues discussed, that is, of those repre-senting the poor or landless communities in Africa, andtherefore the meeting could not be considered eitherconsultative or participatory. Furthermore, it was notedthat 70% of the speakers did not work in AfricanInstitutions and that in the first of the workshops, only 3of the 42 presentations were given by women26.

In the same manner, the participation of peasant andlandless organizations in the workshop held in PachucaMexico in May 2002 was scarce, while numerous pea-

sant and human rights organizations protested againstthe proceedings outside the event27.

Despite the fact that the land policies and the actions ofthe multilateral and national organizations affect therural communities’ entitlement to fundamental rights,peasant and landless organizations, women and indige-nous peoples have not played a leading role in this pro-cess. Their participation has been marginal and subjec-ted to language dominated by academic circles, as seenduring the workshops and electronic consultation thatwere carried out over the New Year holiday 2003 to dis-cuss this draft.

In his response to the campaign’s letter on May 8th2002, Kevin Cleaver, Director of Rural Development forthe World Bank specified that the objective of the LPRRwas not to redefine Bank policies but to summarizerecent world-wide research and insights that would helpthe Bank, its client countries, and other donors, to re-examine their policies in this respect and to help totranslate this research into specific operations. On theother hand, the draft of the LPRR was published inNovember 2003 on the Bank’s web page with a remarksaying that the policy research reports are not bindingto Bank operations28.

In a letter that the German Governor of the Bank,Heidemarie Wieczoreck-Zeul, Minister of cooperationand development, addressed to FIAN-Germany in March2003, the Minister affirmed that the LPRR is a technicaldocument and that the Board of Executive Directors willnot decide on it but at most will acknowledge its exis-tence. Regarding the question of whether the LPRR willbe the groundwork for working out new land policies,the minister responded that there is no decision.

However, we know that Bank staff is already preparingrecommendations for the implementation of the con-tents of the LPRR and that the results of the LPRR will bereflected directly in the Country Assistance Strategies.

The lack of transparency and the manipulation of theparticipation denounced by the Campaign at the begin-ning of the consultation process have been confirmed.The Bank disguised the redefinition of its land policy asa mere academic exercise in order to avoid taking res-ponsibility for future operations and to impede any ins-tances of citizen’s control over the process. In addition,the most relevant policies such as the ones concerningland were not discussed by the Bank Board of ExecutiveDirectors but rather left in the hands of technocrats.What is the democratic legitimization of these policies?Who is held accountable for these decisions?

Beyond that, the mechanisms of control and monitoringof the Bank’s activities are very restricted. For rural com-munities, it is practically impossible to stop Bank pro-jects that threaten their rights. Mechanisms like theInspection Panel are insufficient in all respects. TheBrazilian experience with the pilot project of the market-led land reform Cédula de Terra demonstrates this: aninspection of the project was requested by the NationalForum for Agrarian Reform and Rural Justice, a platformthat brings together large and diverse sectors of thepopulation fighting for agrarian reform in Brazil. TheNational Forum was however disqualified by the Bank’smanagement by questioning whether the organizationwas representative and called the validity of its allegedly“philosophical” arguments into question. Despite thefact that empirical evidence was laid before the panel,the panel rejected twice the request for an inspection29.Critical evaluations of this pilot project were not takeninto account and the only evaluation was made by theBank, which recommended the project’s enlargementdespite the problems pointed out there.

The case of the Cédula da Terra program demonstratesthat the Inspections Panel is a very limited instrument,since it is designed to evaluate the impact of specificprojects like dams, mines, etc. from a technical point ofview. Projects related to the policy advisory level whichhave a deeper political and sectoral impact seem to beoutside the jurisdiction of the Panel. There are no moni-toring or ‘watchdog’ devices or institutions that accountfor the World Bank’s activities at this level, althoughpoverty reduction policies have been acquiring morerelevance over the years.

This is a clear manifestation of one of the most basic con-tradictions: the pretense that the World Bank is a techni-cal organization that stays out of internal politics, whenin reality its intervention is on a massive scale, in favor ofthe ruling class and dangerously undermining democra-tic institutions and the democratic process as a whole.

In light of these experiences, nothing positive can beforeseen in the LPRR’s proposal that promotes a landpolicy framework30 which allows guiding government’sinterventions in this sector and converting policies intospecific programs in specific contexts. The land policyframework bears the danger that Bank interventions inthis sector may be implemented in a more systematicand profound way under the appearance of legitimacyand actual participation.

This proposal goes hand in hand with national strategiesof rural development and poverty reduction. This ideawould be very interesting if it gave the actors and thenational institutions the leading role and the autonomy

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in defining agrarian reform and development. However,the Bank continues to impose the policies that it consi-ders a cure-all. Taking this LPRR seriously would result inchanges so radical, in the way the Bank operates, thatthere are good reasons to doubts its feasibility.

The experience with strategies of poverty reduction,regarding the participation of affected populations andsocial movements, in addition to the national autonomyin defining policies, is overwhelming. The Bank prescri-bes these countries strategic formats and gives clearindications to the leaders about the principles and mea-sures that must be respected in order to receive credits.The governments, eager for financial aid, know per-fectly well that they must comply with the conditions ofthe World Bank. If the Bank’s prescriptions conflict withnational aims and strategies, the latter will have to beaccommodated to the former or be sacrificed as it hasbeen observed in Cambodia, Vietnam and Uganda31.

As far as social participation is concerned, which ishighly valued by the Bank for its results in the strengt-hening of civil society, the appropriation and effective-ness of policies, as well as for increasing government’sresponsibility, the results of the World Bank have hadserious effects: In Sri Lanka for example, consultation tocivil society was restricted to inviting a few NGO’s whichwere given a draft on poverty reduction strategy, underthe condition that this draft could not be modified.While peasant organizations along with those of fisher-men, labor unions, and other grassroots social move-ments were totally excluded from the consultation, thesuggestions of the Chamber of Commerce of Ceylonand other business associations were taken into accountin the strategy. For that reason, the Alliance for theProtection of National Resources and Human Rightsaffirmed the consultation was a total farce32.

For the Global Campaign for Agrarian Reform, the basicstarting point consists in the human right to feed one-self and the right of farmers to produce and safeguardtheir food sovereignty.

The human right to food, as recognized in article 11 ofthe International Covenant on Economic, Social andCultural Rights ICESCR, indicates that peasant commu-nities are entitled to access to productive resources,specifically land. Each state and community of Statesthat forms part of the ICESCR is then obliged to res-pect, protect and fulfil access to productive resources.Agrarian reform constitutes a human right obligationbecause it is the central measure that provides poor far-mers/peasants with access to and control over land,seeds, water and other productive resources.

Therefore, discussing agrarian reform in terms of humanrights means discussing the legal obligations which sta-tes have to comply with. In this sense, agrarian reformprograms are not simply questions of ‘best practices’and policy choices. International human rights law setsthe standards that governments must adhere to andwhich can be monitored by citizens. These standards orlegal obligations allow for citizens to claim their rightsbefore a tribunal and put governments under publicscrutiny.

Human rights also allow to defy any unjust judicial fra-mework, economic arguments and development theo-ries that negate the necessity of instituting agrarianreform programs or favor agricultural models based onlarge scale modernized production. Human rights con-front these theories with the fact that the implementa-tion of such a fundamental right like the right to food isnot something that can be postponed until there is suf-ficient economic growth. The ICESCR demands that sta-tes apply these basic criteria in order to fulfill rights suchas, for example, the immediate guarantee of a core con-tent of rights, the right not to be discriminated against,the right to the participation of vulnerable or affectedgroups in the design of public policies. Also vulnerablegroups must be identified and protected and the maxi-mum of available resources must be utilized to progres-sively realize rights. This would mean that agrarianreform has to have priority over any other program ofrural development, because there are not many diffe-rent alternatives to agricultural production that offerincome to the rural poor population. In this sense, notapplying agrarian reform programs implies perpetua-ting gender inequality, as well as hunger, and the mal-nutrition of rural and marginalized families.

For the Global Campaign for Agrarian Reform then, thekey questions of the debate over land policy that natio-nal governments and those governing responsible forinternational cooperation are obligated to answer arethe following: How can rural communities implementtheir right to define/determine their own future? Howwill rural communities be included in the design ofpolicy and programs at the national and internationallevel? How can a clear and participatory body be esta-blished to monitor the implementation of land and ruraldevelopment policies at the national and internationallevel? How can we assure that monitoring mechanismshave enough power to suspend ongoing policies likethose of the World Bank that are unjust towards ruralcommunities? What mechanisms are can allow ruralcommunities to complain and demand reparations ifthese policies and their implementation are negative forthe enjoyment of their rights?

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1 An analysis of how the approach “growth in favor of the poor” inPoverty Reduction Growth Facility of FMI and in Poverty ReductionStrategy Papers of BM remains pure rhetoric while the liberal rigid modelis still in force can be found in: Chavez Malaluan, Jenina Joy / Guttal,Shalmali 2003: “Poverty Reduction Strategy Papers: A Poor Package forPoverty Reduction” ath t t p : / / w w w. e u ro d a d . o rg / u p l o a d s t o re / c m s / d o c s / A P o o rPackageforPovertyReduction.doc . Gomes, Rafael/Lawson, Max 2003:“Pro-poor Macroeconomic Policies Require Poverty and Social ImpactAnalysis”. Economic Policy Empowerment Programme, EURODAD athttp://www.eurodad.org/uploadstore/cms/docs/PSIAandpropoormacropoliciesDDfinal.pdf.2 See among others, Ishii-Eiteman, M./ Hamburger, J. 2002: “Pesticide andBiotech Companies: The Wrong Partners for the World Bank. PesticideAction Network North America, San Francisco” at http://www.panna.org/resources/documents/badPartners.dv.html. PANNA’s fact sheets onBayer, Dow, DuPont, Monsanto and Syngenta (http://www.panna.org/resources/wb.html). Kennedy, D. 2001: Rio Tinto: Global CompactViolator. July 13, 2001 at http://www.corpwatch.org/campaigns/PCD.jsp?articleid=622. Stop ExxonMobil Alliance Web site,http://www.stopexxonmobil.org/static/agm_statement.html. Friends ofthe Earth 2000: “Dubious Development: How the World Bank’s PrivateArm is Failing the Poor and the Environment”. Washington, DC.3 To illustrate deep problems of approach and functioning of social secu-rity nets, see Bank Information Center, 1999: “Problem Project Alert #5:Two Loans in Indonesia: Social Safety Net Adjustment Loan (SSNAL) andPolicy Reform Support Loan II (PRSL-II)” at http://www.bicusa.org/asia/ppa_indonesia1.htm.4 On the disastrous effects of land policies, see the following chapter ofthis paper.5 The Structural Adjustment Participatory Review International Network2002: “The Policy Roots of Economic Crisis and Poverty: A Multi-CountryParticipatory Assessment of Structural Adjustment” athttp://www.saprin.org.6 See ETC group 2003: Oligopoly Inc. Concentration in Corporate Power2003. Communiqué, issue # 82, November/December 2003. Heffernan,William / Hendrikson, Mary 2002: Multi-national concentrated food pro-cessing and marketing systems and the farm crisis. Paper presented at theannual meeting of the AAAS Symposium Science and Sustainability. TheFarm Crisis: How the heck did we get here? Boston7 To illustrate interests conflicts and influences of biotechnology and pes-ticide industries in the design and implementation of Bank policies, seeletter of Pesticide Action Network Regional Centers and Partners to theWorld Bank, February 2003 at http://www.panna.org/campaigns/docsWorldBank/docsWorldBank_030207.dv.html#_ftn10.8 The same as above.9 See ETC Group 2003: Terminator Technology – Five Years Later.Communiqué, Issue #79, May/June 2003, Winnipeg. ETC Group 2002:Biopiratería +10. Premios Capitán Garfio 2002. Communiqué, N° 75,Marzo/Abril 2002, Winnipeg.10 FIAN 2002: “Starving the Future. Violations of the Right to Food in theContext of Ecodestruction”. Heidelberg.11 See Via Campesina account on biodiversity, biosecurity, and geneticresources.12 See among others: Hickey, Ellen / Mittal, Anuradha (eds.) 2003: “VoicesFrom the South: The Third World Debunks Corporate Myths onGenetically Engineered Crops”. Altieri, Miguel / Rosset, Peter 1999: “Tenreasons why biotechnology will not ensure food security, protect the envi-ronment and reduce poverty in the developing world” athttp://www.foodfirst.org/progs/global/ge/altieri-11-99.html. 13 See Deere, C. D. and M. León de Leal 2001: Empowering women : landand property rights in Latin America. Pittsburgh, University of PittsburghPress. 14 “First, all major decisions regarding the future of the ejido (whether toparcelize and/or dissolve the ejido or to enter into joint ventures) are tobe made by the recognized ejido members (Article 28 in TribunalesAgrarios 1994). This means that the spouses and partners of ejido mem-bers are excluded from decision-making. In effect, most women (sincethey make up only 18 percent of all ejido members) have no direct parti-cipation in determining the future of their communities. A second provi-sion eroding women=s rights, and the most dramatic change introducedin the new legislation, is that upon a majority vote of ejido members, eji-datarios may acquire a title to this land and dispose of it as they see fit,including renting or selling it. What was considered a family resource—the family patrimony—becomes the individual property of the ejidatario[...]. If an ejidatario decides to sell his parcel, his spouse/partner and chil-dren have what is called the „right of first buyer“ (derecho de tanto);however, they have only thirty days to make arrangements to purchasethe land. Given the low wages and incomes of rural women it is doubtfulthat many will be able to exercise this right should their husbands decideto sell the family plot [...]. Third, and a major departure from previous prac-tice, inheritance provisions no longer assure that access to ejido land willremain within the family. Now ejidatarios may freely choose their heir,which may be the spouse or concubine, one of the children, a parent orany other person (Article 17 in Tribunales Agrarios 1994; our emphasis).Moreover, the designated heir no longer has any responsibility to providesupport to those who were economically dependent upon the deceased.

This change in inheritance procedures places rural women in a muchmore precarious position than ever before with respect to land rights [...]”(Deere, Carmen Diana / León, Magdalena 2003: “Reversing GenderExclusionary Agrarian Reform: Lessons from Latin America”. Mimeo, p.16).15 See, Carter, Michael 2002: “Distribution-Sensitive Land Poliy ImpactAnalysis”. Paper prepared for the Land Administration Workshop. Inter-American Development Bank, Washington.16 See note of Pastoral Land commission of Paran/Brazil, about the visit ofWorld Bank technicians who attempted to convince them about thebenefits of land leasing system to solve the problems of unfair distributionof land in Brazil, in: CPT denuncia nova farsa do Banco Mundial, June2003, in http://www.cpt.org.br/?system=news&action=read&id=133&eid=126.17 See FIAN/La Via Campesina 2000: “La política de tierras del BancoMundial” Informational sheet, Heidelberg. See also “La tierra es muchomás que una mercancía“ International petition addressed to the WorldBank. Global campaign on Agrarian Reform, December 2002. 18 For more information on the effects of this law, see Land Center forHuman Rights 2001: Rights of Farmers Between Claims of Reclamationand Market Illusions. Land and Farmer Series Issue N° 12, Cairo. See alsoFIAN 2000: The Right to Adequate Food in Egypt. Parallel Report sub-mitted at the occasion of the 22. session of the Committee on Economic,Social and Cultural Rights by FIAN International, Heidelberg.19 See Amnesty International 1998: Annual Report on the Middle East andNorth Africa.20 Deininger, K. 2001: Land Markets and Land Reform. Paper presented atthe International Conference on Access to Land: Innovative AgrarianReforms for Sustainability and Poverty Reduction. Bonn, March 19-23,2001, p. 24.21 See CONGCOOP/CNOC 2002: FONTIERRAS: “El modelo de mercadoy el acceso a la tierra en Guatemala. Balance y perspectivas” GuatemalaSee Borras, Saturnino 2003: Questioning Market-Led Agrarian Reform:Experiences from Brazil, Colombia and South Africa. Journal of AgrarianChange, vol. 3, N° 3, July 2003. Dias Victor, Andréa / Sauer, Sergio 2002:Estudo sobre a política do Banco Mundial para o setor agrário brasileirocom base no caso do Programa Cédula da Terra. Brasilia. INESC 2002: “ElBanco Mundial y el Banco de la Tierra: Profundización de la pobreza enBrasil”. Nota Técnica N° 59, Brasilia.22 See CONGCOOP/CNOC 2002: Deere, Carmen Diana / León,Magdalena 2001, Walker, Cherryl 2002: “Agrarian Change, Gender andLand Reform. A South African Case Study”. UNRISD Social Policy andDevelopment Programme, Paper Number 10, April 2002.23 See Monsalve Suárez, Sofia 2002. Marcos legales y conflictos de tierras:Análisis desde una perspective de derechos humanos, en: ReformaAgraria, Colonización y Cooperativas, 2002/2. FAO, Roma. UN GeneralAssembly 2002: The Right to Food. Note by the Secretary-General,A/57/356. 27/ FIAN/La Via Campesina 2000: Reforma Agraria: una obli-gación de derechos humanos. Folleto de información. Heidelberg. 24 See Rosset, Peter 2001: tides shift on Agrarian Reform: New MovementsShow the Way, Food First Backgrounder Vol. 7, N. 1 (2001), Institute forFood and Development Policy, Oakland.25 Statement by some participants from civil society on the World BankWorkshop on Land Issues in Africa, Kampala, 29 April- 2 May 2002.26 See La Jornada, May 21 de 2002.27 See http://lnweb18.worldbank.org/ESSD/ardext.nsf/24ByDocName/PRRe-Discussion28 Sauer, Sergio/ Wolff, Luciano 2001: O Painel de Inspecao e o caso doCédula de Terra, in: Barros, Flavia (ed.) 2001: Banco Mundial, Participacao,Transparencia e Responsabilizacao. A experiencia brasileira com o Painelde Inspecao. Rede Brasil, Brasília.29 The national policy ‘marco’ would connect the land policies with poli-cies to combat poverty, establishing low priorities among larger nationalgoals and would look to win the political support of the majority of thepopulation. In such, ‘marco’ is considered beneficial to generate consen-sus, to help to prioritize actions and guarantee participation in the imple-mentation and vigilancy of the policies. As the way this process will bedeveloped, the report principly specifies two things: for one part the defi-nition of the policy ‘marco’ will be based on the broad dialogue that couldbe monitored using ‘standard instruments.’ The other side is that thereport conveniently considers that projects would be evaluated and putin the debate over decision making about the ‘marco’ policies.International donors are calling for the support of these type of projects.(World Bank 2003: op. cit. p. 179). 30 See Chavez Malauan, Jeninia Joy /Guttal, Shalmali 2003.31 See MONLAR 2003: Compelling the poor to subsidize the rich. Analysisof Connecting to Growth: Sri Lanka’s Poverty Reduction Strategy. Mimeo.

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