The Briefing Room
General Category => World News => Topic started by: EC on July 07, 2014, 04:40:08 pm
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An estimated 90% of land in Africa has no registered owner, including areas farmed for generations by the same families in Mali. Multinational companies see opportunities to develop these areas, and governments in Mali and elsewhere hail such projects as bringers of progress. But for villagers who lose their ancestral lands – not just where they have farmed, but where many have buried their forebears – such advances are a catastrophe. In these scenes from Hugo Berkeley and Osvalde Levat's documentary Land Rush, Malians battle to prevent the increasing acquisition of their land. Watch the full film here
Excerpt video at link: http://www.theguardian.com/global-development/video/2014/jul/07/mali-land-grabs-farmer-video
Full video, 58 minutes: http://www.whypoverty.net/video/land-rush/
Land is a powerful thing in most of Africa. It is usually owned in common, with settled villages and nomadic tribes sharing (often reluctantly) the land. The full video is well worth watching, if you have the time.