Community Land Rights

Vast swathes of the world’s land - nearly five billion hectares - are unprotected and vulnerable to land grabs and destruction.

In line with the Sustainable Development Goals, the ILC works for the full involvement of local communities in the ownership and management of this land so that it can be protected.

In December 2020, protesters and community activists successfully prevented the government of Montenegro from occupying traditional pasture land for military activities.

See our section on indigenous peoples for a full profile of LRN’s mission and work

For 51 days, community members and activists braved snowy and sub-zero weather in a protest camp at the foot of Margita mountain, epicentre of an area designated for military training by the outgoing Montenegrin government. Camping within the site earmarked for the army, they successfully prevented the military from accessing their pastures.

Their aim was to maintain a blockade until a new government, more sympathetic to Sinjajevina’s plight, was installed. An unexpected delay in the transition triggered a game of cat and mouse between herders and the military, and made headlines in Montenegro and abroad.

On December 5, 2020, the new Minister of Defense, Olivera Injac, announced that there would be no military training and invited protesters to go home. She committed to examining all documentation related to Sinjajevina and to talk to the local residents as soon as the opportunity arises.

But locals and activists of the Save Sinjajevina association are only temporarily relieved.

They are still calling for the government to scrap the decree establishing the military training ground, and to create a protected area that is co-designed and co-governed by local communities.

In Cameroon, community-led conservation is gaining momentum as a response to the intensification of land and natural resources exploitation.

Recent years have seen growing pressure on land from large infrastructure projects, mining, agro-industries, and logging.

The country has a dual system of land rights, with customary land rights recognised alongside registered land rights. However, protection for customary land rights is often weaker than it is for formal registration. As a result, community land has been exploited by external investors, with minimal or no benefit for the local community. NGOs have been supporting local community members to conduct participatory mapping of their community lands to enhance their protection. But mapping on the same piece of land by different actors often produced different and irreconcilable maps, leading to the disqualification of participatory mapping as a reliable tool for identifying community land rights and resources.

In certain cases, the National Institute for Cartography was not able to validate some land maps and the local communities were not able to claim their land rights based on the land maps.

As part of the NES in Cameroon, ILC member Centre pour l’Environnement et le Développement (CED) partnered with government departments, the Rainforest Foundation UK (RFUK), Forest Peoples Programme (FPP), community leaders and community members to develop a harmonised and generally accepted land mapping methodology.

Find out how they did it here.

For the full picture on how ILC members and partners are securing community land rights against dispossession, expropriation and eviction in Cameroon, click here.

Over the last 3 years, the Community Land Protection Learning Initiative has contributed to securing land rights and strengthening struggles in nine countries.

Together with Namati, and the International Institute for Environment and Development (IIED), the Community Land Protection Initiative is equipping ILC members with the practical skills to support communities to document and protect their indigenous and customary lands.

The initiative, offered to selected ILC members, provides a unique opportunity to engage in cutting-edge community land protection efforts and embark on a year-long peer-to-peer learning journey.

Each year, a select number of participants teach one another their most successful fieldwork strategies, collaborate on innovative solutions to complex problems, and pool their knowledge and expertise in ways that can then offer lessons to members across ILC’s network.

This is one of the participants, Karina, who takes us through how by using the human impact assessment tool , you can put communities at the centre of any decision making process and make companies more accountable and processes more inclusive.

This was the result of a collective exchange that took place during the second workshop of the Community Land Protection Learning Initiative, in July 2019. Contributing members included: RMI, JKPP, RRF, Observatorio Ciudadano, ICCA, IIED and NAMATI.

Learn from the participants