Dr John Mduma, EfD research fellow at EfD Tanzania participated in the conference "Land Governance in Support of the Millennium Development Goals: Responding to new challenges", held in Washington DC, March 9-10, 2009. He shares his experiences and thoughts in an interview below.
EfD members from six countries participated in the conference. Presentations were held by Jintao Xu, EfD in China, Tekie Alemu, EfD in Ethiopia, and Stein Holden, EfD Associate. John Mduma represented EfD Tanzania. Wilfred Nyangena represented EfD in Kenya, and Gunnar Köhlin, EfD Director, participated as chair and discussant.
"I found the themes presented of great significance to EfD and EfD Tanzania in particular", says Dr John Mduma, who participated in the conference.
He ascertains that Land governance is coming up as an agenda which has not been studied in a satisfactory manner in most developing countries. Thus, it appears that land governance will soon be an integral part of the research agenda, especially in relation to climate change, food security, energy scarcity, natural disasters, urban growth, and environmental degradation.
"Certainly, these are the issues from which EfD Tanzania could find a niche for its future research agenda. Furthermore, the policy relevance of research in these issues are high and the demand is increasing due to recent development in large agricultural land acquisition in Tanzania in the name of bio-fuel, etc. As such, parcels of land conflicts - crop growers versus pastoralists - noted in the recent past, is one the indicators of the need for further look into Tanzania land governance issues", says Mduma.
Mduma learned that Evaluation of land policy/program changes is an area which has also not received enough attention in the development research in Tanzania. A series of presentations on this aspect indicates that to have an effective and efficient evaluation, preparation should start right from the design of the program. Only in rare accessional could one find a natural experiment that allow such evaluation.
"Thus, if EfD Tanzania is to have a visible and active engagement in environmental issues related to land, we have to start influencing the design of the land programs. It is highly likely that EfD Tanzania will be called at some points to deal with land issues. Therefore, it is imperative that we start networking with key stakeholders in land policy" says Mduma.
Dr. Mduma noted that the presentation on Social tenure for the poorest, which was implemented through the Social Tenure Domain Model, was an eye opener to what can be done beyond formal and traditional model of land rights/titling. Where it has been piloted, the said model provides promising results. However, its introduction and use in Tanzania will require further research for which EfD Tanzania can actively participate.
By Salvatory Macha