International Land Coalition

History of the International Land Coalition

Sustainable land use is basic to the achievement of lasting solutions to hunger and poverty

In November 1995 over 1,000 representatives of civil society organizations, governments, the Bretton Woods institutions, United Nations agencies and EU institutions came together in Brussels for the Conference on Hunger and Poverty. The conference recognized the importance of equity in access to land for rural development and resolved to create an alliance of civil society and intergovernmental agencies: the Popular Coalition to Eradicate Hunger and Poverty :

"The rural poor must be given access to land and water resources, they must be permitted to participate in the design, implementation and evaluation of rural development programmes.. Growth is necessary but not sufficient; it must be buttressed by equity and, above all, by people's participation."

These goals will require:
".policy changes, community capacity building and direct support to innovative actions"; and ".the revival of agrarian reform on the national and international agenda as a necessary condition for empowerment and sustainable development for the poor." ¹

The founding Conference, called for urgent action to empower the rural poor by increasing their access to productive assets, especially land, water and common property, and by increasing their direct participation in decision-making processes at local, national, regional and international levels on matters affecting their livelihood systems.

In 2003 the organization was transformed into the International Land Coalition (ILC) as part of strategic focus on land access issues from the earlier wider mandate. The name reflects our identity (an international organization), our focus (land, which by definition includes natural resources) and our nature (a coalition of organizations). In 1995 land issues had fallen from the development agenda. ILC responded by promoting the need to put land back on the agenda. It did so by working with its civil society and intergovernmental members to advocate for secure access to land.

Today land is not only back on the agenda, it is confirmed to be linked to many development goals, from food security, to conflict prevention, to peace and security, to combating desertification and environmental degradation. As the 2006 external evaluation concluded²:

There is now more than ever a
“need for effective mechanisms that
encourage and foster dialogue about
land issues. Dialogue is particularly
needed given the fact that land
issues tend to be not only technical
questions, but issues with highly
sensitive political and social
implications. This presents a very
positive context for an organization
like ILC, whose mission and objectives
seem to be even more relevant today
than they were a decade ago.”

Note
1 see The Peasants' Charter
2 International Land Coalition, External Evaluation - Final Report, August 2006. Universalia