Civil Society Organisations and land reform in Madagascar

1
Civil Society Organisations and land reform in
Madagascar

• RAMAROSON Mino
• SIF platform Vice-Chairwoman
• HARDI Director
• Rome, December 2008

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CSOs and land issues
Background 1

• 1960 Customary land management VS positive
  rights
• breakdown of the mechanism
• 1999 Reform proposition
• Cadastral process simplified
• 2004 Reform proposition based on
  decentralisation and modernisation
• Land policy Letter (February 2005)

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CSOs and land issues
Background 2

• NGOs and farmers organisations work on
  supporting farmers access to land (before 2002)
• ? Great difficulties for each organisation to
  achieve their goals
• Meeting of the CSOs in Antananarivo to discuss
  land issues (2003)
• ? SIF Platform created

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The land reform policy First phase

• HARDIs experience with the National Land Reform
  Program Office -PNF experimentation of
  decentralized land reform
• SIF PLATFORM role
• Raising awareness of local communities and
  Decentralized Territorial Collectivities
• Advocacy to give an importance to the role of
  local authorities and local communities in the
  land access process
• Offered to be a member of the PNF orientation
  and follow-up committee (Comité dorientation et
  de suivi)

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The land reform policySecond phase

• PNFs redirecting not suitable for HARDIs
  principles and values
• The SIF has become a consultative organisation
  only
• Promoting land rights and raising awareness in
  the communities
• Setting up a database to monitor land policy in
  Madagascar

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SIF platform difficulties in land policy
monitoring

• CSOs are often used by the PNF and the government
  to improve their image in front of donators
• Lack of capacity to anticipate misuses of the
  land reform
• Lack of communication between SIF members
• Recognition of the local CSOs (SIF) by the
  authorities requires the support of international
  organisations (ILC)
• No recognition of the CSOs by decentralized
  services and by central services staff

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SIF platform assets in land policy monitoring

• Agreement with the PNF evolution and
  implementation of the reform follow-up
• Platform solicited on particular points of the
  fundamental policy
• Reactivity of the platform when problems occur
• Representativeness and diversity of the members
  across all regions of Madagascar
• Availability of tools to publicize the SIFs
  ideas and perception of the current situation
  (newsletter, radio and television broadcast,)

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Risks for SIF

• Members of the platform not powerful enough to
  assure the sustainability of the platform
• Intensity of the SIFs willpower could decrease
  with the increase in the number member
  organizations
• Political takeover of the SIF image or name (the
  government, political opponents, etc.)

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Challenges

• Increasing the SIFs renown
• Updating the information and database to
  anticipate the consequences of land pressure on
  the poor

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Thank you