In this media briefing, Oxfam reveals that investors are targeting the world’s weakest-governed countries to buy land, and it calls on the World Bank to lead the fight against land grabs. It argues that the Bank is in a unique position to act because it sets international standards for land investments, provides finance for land deals and advises developing countries on land investments. Oxfam’s analysis reveals that over three quarters of the 56 countries where land deals were agreed between 2000 and 2011 scored below average on four key governance indicators. The 23 least developed countries account for more than half of the recorded land deals over this period. Researchers assessed a range of factors including voice and accountability (e.g. whether citizens participate in selecting their government), rule of law, the quality of private sector regulation, and control of corruption. They found poor governance is good business for investors looking to secure land quickly and cheaply. Investors seem to be cherry-picking countries with weak rules and regulations. This can spell disaster for communities if these deals result in their homes and livelihoods being snatched away without consent or compensation.
Poverty and health
This paper critically analyses the denial of the right of access to safe drinking water and sanitation. In so doing, it engages with the debate about whether access to water is a human right, using the situation in the rural areas of the Eastern Cape Province as a case study. Water in rural areas of the Eastern Cape continues to be regarded as a scarce resource, while at the same time the Constitution asserts that everyone has a right to access sufficient water and sanitation. The author argues that it is the duty of SA’s Government to work effectively for the progressive realisation of the right to access sufficient water and sanitation in rural areas. It should prioritise improvement of access to water in those areas where there is greatest need. Water sources must be as close as possible to households and water should be available on a daily basis. It should be as accessible and affordable as possible, particularly for the most marginalised and vulnerable members of SA society. An adequate policy should also be developed and monitored to prevent pollution of water resources and encourage water conservation.
The South African government has announced it will no longer pursue the willing buyer-willing seller option for land redistribution, citing the process as slowing down the speed of land reform. President Jacob Zuma listed land reform as a priority area for 2013 in his State of the Nation address on 14 February 2013. June 2013 will mark the centenary of the 1913 Land Act, whereby the British dispossessed African people of their land. He argued that the legacy of the Native Land Act still lives, and as a result many native families are still working for white farmers only for their food. Zuma said the land question needs to be resolved amicably within the framework of the Constitution and the law. But he called for the time it takes to finalise a claim to be shortened. In this regard, Government will now pursue the ‘just and equitable’ principle for compensation as set out in the Constitution instead of the willing buyer- willing seller principle, which forces the State to pay more for land than the actual value. Government’s mid-term review in 2012 revealed a number of shortcomings in the land reform implementation programme, which Zuma says will be used to improve implementation. He also pointed out that better incentives need to be provided for commercial farmers that are willing and capable of mentoring smallholder farmers.
According to this paper, development aid and policy discussions often assume that poorer countries have less internal capacity for redistribution in favour of their poorest citizens. The author tested this assumption for 90 developing countries. He found that most countries fall into one of two groups: those with little or no realistic prospect of addressing extreme poverty through redistribution from the wealthy, and those that would appear to have ample scope for such redistribution. He found that increased per capita income tends to move countries from the first group to the second. The author argues that the marginal tax rates needed to fill the poverty gap for the international poverty line of $1.25 a day are clearly prohibitive (marginal tax rates of 100% or more) for the majority of countries with consumption per capita under $2,000 per year at 2005 PPP. Even covering half the poverty gap would require prohibitive marginal tax rates in the majority of poor countries. Yet amongst better-off developing countries—over $4,000 per year (say)—the marginal tax rates needed for substantial pro-poor redistribution are very small—less than 1% on average, and under 6% in all cases. He found that economic growth tends to move countries from the first group to the second, concluding that the appropriate balance between growth and redistribution strategies can be seen to depend on the level of economic development.
Food prices are at their highest since the 2008 global food crisis, according to this report released by the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO). In mid-2008, international food prices reached their highest level in 30 years, sparking one of the worst food crises in recent times and pushing more than a billion people into hunger. The global average price of food - including cereals, cooking oil, meat and dairy products - was 25% higher in December 2010 than in December 2009, according to the report. FAO suggests that countries with bumper crops or ample stocks of staple foods should maintain strategic reserves, and food-importing countries should think strategically and negotiate favourable trading terms. Rising fuel prices could also have a negative impact on food production and distribution in 2011. In Kenya and Tanzania, maize prices remained stable and at low levels in December 2010, mostly reflecting the good 2010 main harvests. However, in Uganda prices have risen considerably, driven by demand from Kenya, a traditional importer, as well as from southern Sudan and Rwanda. In Mozambique, maize prices continued their upward trend during December 2010. Madagascar also reported a significant increase in the price of the country’s main staple, rice, which is imported.
According to Vision 2030, the Kenyan government’s strategic plan on how to boost growth and development in Kenya, there are an estimated five million out of an estimated eight million households who depend directly on agriculture, despite the fact that agriculture continues to be one of the most under-budgeted ministries. Under the current financial year, agriculture has only been awarded a meagre 3.6% of the national budget, which a long way off the 10% mark that the government had committed to set aside for the agricultural sector. With an overdependence on agriculture for both subsistence and commercial purposes, a large number of the population is in dire need of food aid. Aid organisations such as the World Food Programme say an estimated 1.6 million Kenyans face starvation. The situation has deteriorated due to drastic climatic changes, whereby the rains are no longer reliable and most Kenyans are yet to adapt to innovative and sustainable means of trapping rainwater. According to the Kenya Food Security Meeting - the main co-ordinating body that brings together food security actors in a forum to map out various strategies to improve food security - while there has been a notable improvement of short rains in severely drought-affected pastoral areas, there have been a general rain failure in the country since 2007, which has resulted in the deterioration in food security. It is against this background that researchers have intensified research on crops that can grow in most parts of the country and that can be used to alleviate food insecurity. This research has led many Kenyans to accommodate traditional vegetables that in past years were dismissed in favour of Western vegetables, including highly nutritious and easy-to-grow indigenous crops like African eggplant, nightshades and cow peas. According to this article, most Western vegetables are unaffordable to poor people, who account for an estimated 60% of the rural population.
This report provides a quantitative assessment of the poverty situation in Mozambique in 2008/09 and associated trends. It indicates no improvement in poverty levels at the national level, which remained essentially the same as levels in 2002/03, at slightly less than 55% of the population. Nutrition indicators for children under five years also showed little progress at the national level during the same period. In rural areas, distance to the nearest primary health facility was significantly reduced, while access in urban areas to primary health facilities appears to have worsened slightly. Access to safe water also showed no improvement, with less than one third of all households in the rural centre and rural north of the country having access.
Swaziland's declining revenue from customs tax in the face of growing unemployment is exerting pressure on public health services and food production. According to this article, the government recently conceded that unemployment was running at 40%, but economists expect this to rise, pushing up already high poverty levels - about two-thirds of Swazis live in chronic poverty. Agricultural production has been reduced in line with government cuts in essential programmes, but government spending on non-essential programmes has not been cut. Despite having the world's highest HIV prevalence rate, Swaziland has reportedly announced plans to cut spending on HIV and AIDS programmes by 10% in 2011.
Save the Children’s suggested post-2015 development framework champions universal and equitable development, with human rights as its guiding principle and evidence as a foundation for its approaches. And, unlike with the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs), these principles must be visible in the targets established. Save the Children argues that it is possible to set zero targets for absolute poverty, hunger, and preventable child and maternal deaths, as well as 100% access to safe drinking water and sanitation. Five lessons can be learnt from the MDGs, according to the report. 1. The MDGs do not consistently confront inequality, whether it is because of age, gender, caste, disability, geography or income. 2. A robust, effective accountability mechanism is missing from the MDG framework. 3. The MDGs do not pay attention to synergies and interaction of systems, like poverty, health and education. 4. The MDGs focus inputs and not outcomes, which might result in greater access but this does not automatically mean that the aims of that service are being realised. 5. Since 2000 little has been achieved in improving the long-term sustainability of the natural resource base.
Faced with increasingly unpredictable rains and rising agricultural input costs, many of Swaziland's smallholder farmers are no longer able to make a living relying on traditional methods to grow maize, the staple crop, according to IRIN News. Externally funded schemes to subsidise the cost of seed and fertiliser have dried up and a Ministry of Agriculture service to provide affordable tractor hire has been a casualty of the government's cash flow problems. Distribution schemes to the needy are failing because of a lack of technical assistance to ensure that recipients use the inputs correctly for maximum benefit. Their reach was also small, with experts estimating that only about a tenth of Swaziland's 260,000 farming households benefited. As the cost of both inputs and food has risen significantly over the past year, many subsistence farmers have had to prioritise food over fertiliser in the context of declining maize production during the 2011-12 season.