www.iss.nl/ldpi
International Academic Conference on
Global Land Grabbing II
Organized by the Land Deals Politics Initiative (LDPI) in collaboration with the Department of
Development Sociology at Cornell University
17-19 October 2012
Provisional Schedule
We would like to acknowledge the following who, along with many institutions that have supported individual
participants, have provided financial support to the conference: the UK Department for International Development,
the Deutsche Gesellschaft für Internationale Zusammenarbeit (GIZ), the Ford Foundation, the Norwegian Forum
for Environment and Development and ICCO, the inter-church organisation for development cooperation, the
Polson Institute in the Department of Development Sociology, Cornell, and the Land Team ISS Theme project,
Cornell University.
Wednesday October 17
8:30
Registration and breakfast (RPCC entrance and Third Floor)
9:30
Opening session (RPCC multipurpose room): Chair: Ruth Hall (PLAAS)
Welcome: Wendy Wolford, Development Sociology, Cornell University, USA
Welcome and Opening Address: Saturnino (‘Jun’) Borras Jr., JPS Editor, International
Institute of Social Studies (ISS), The Hague, and LDPI co-coordinator
Plenary discussion: defining the big questions for the conference
11:00 Coffee (RPCC Third Floor)
11:30 Plenary panel: The ‘Big Questions’ in land grabbing (RPCC Multipurpose room)
Chair: Ben White (ISS)
Dzodzi Tsikata, University of Ghana
John Wilkinson, UFRRJ
Jesse Ribot, University of Illinois
Phil McMichael, Cornell University
Lorenzo Cotula, IIED
Melissa Leach, IDS Sussex
13:00 Lunch (RPCC Third Floor)
14:00 Panel session 1 (Panels 1 – 5)
Panel 1: Framing the Debate: Global Perspectives
*Chair: Haroon Akram-Lodhi, Trent University, Canada (tbc)
*Tania Li, Department of Geography, University of Toronto, Canada, What is Land? An
Anthropological Perspective on How Land Becomes an Investment Opportunity
*Farshad Araghi, Department of Sociology, Florida Atlantic University, Land Grabs Redux?
Land Rights, ‘Hunger Regimes,’ and the Global Crisis of Reproduction
*Elena Baglioni, Queen Mary’s University / Future Agricultures Consortium, Agrarian Change
and the Dynamics of Land Grabbing in Africa: Investigating Theoretical and Historical
Antecedents
*Saturnino M. Borras Jr, Jenny C. Franco, Carol Hunsberger, Wang Chunyu, New Agents in
Global Land Use: The Role of State-capital Alliance
Panel 2: Understanding the Grabbers I: New Financiers
*Chair: Jim Boyce, University of Massachusetts, USA (tbc)
*Madeleine Fairbairn, Community and Environmental Sociology, University of WisconsinMadison, USA, “Just another asset class”? Farmland investment and financialization
*Mazen Labban, Department of Geography, Rutgers University, and Miles Kenney-Lazar,
Graduate School of Geography, Clark University, USA, Capitalizing land: Sovereign Wealth
Funds in the global land grab
*George Meszaros, University of Warwick, UK and Sérgio Sauer, Universidade de Brasília,
Brazil, Bank and land: origins and drivers of international investments in land and agro-industry
*Emmanuel Tumusiime, Oxfam America, USA, Sector-wide Analysis of the Participation of
U.S. Investment Funds in Large-Scale Land Acquisitions
Panel 3: Governance I: Communities and Consultation
*Chair: Liz Fitting, Dalhousie University, Canada
*Cécile Famerée, Leiden Institute of Areas Studies, University of Leiden, Netherlands, Can
transparency and consultation make land grabbing pro-poor? A critical look at the credibility of
land rights institutions in the Peruvian jungle
2
*Susanne Johanna Väth, Institute for Co-operation in Developing Countries, Philipps-University
Marburg, Germany, Gaining neighbours or disruptive factors – what happened when large-scale
land-based investment in the Ghanaian oil palm sector met the local population on the ground?
*Amanda Hammar, Centre for African Studies, Copenhagen University, Denmark, The Missing
Middle: Exploring what lies between mega-project mania and peasant populism in Mozambique
*Paul Munro-Faure, Food and Agricultural Organization, United Nations, Italy, Land, Tenure
and Property
Panel 4: Resistance I: Local Struggles and Covert Resistance
Chair: Ruth Meinzen-Dick, International Food Policy Research Institute, USA (tbc)
*Theresa Selfa and Renata Moreno, Department of Environmental Studies, Syracuse University,
USA, and Carmen Bain, Department of Sociology, Iowa State University, Expansion of
Sugarcane Ethanol in the Valle de Cauca, Colombia: Exploring Land and Water Conflicts and
Prospects for Governance of Biofuels
*Giuliano Martiniello, Makerere University, The Accumulation of Dispossession and Resistance
in Northern Uganda
*Connor Cavanagh and Tor Benjaminsen, Department of International Environment and
Development Studies (Noragric), Norwegian University of Life Sciences, Norway, Of
Biopolitics, Resistance, and Livelihood Sovereignty: Linking Cases from Mali, Tanzania, and
Uganda
*Karen McAllister, Department of Anthropology, McGill University, Canada
Rubber, rights and resistance: local and transnational land grabbing in northern Laos
Panel 5: Labor Regimes and ‘Business Models’ I: Joint Ventures
Chair: Ben Cousins, Institute for Poverty, Land and Agrarian Studies, South Africa
*Kan Liu, Department of Geography, University of California, Los Angeles, USA, Transforming
Villages: A Case Study of the Consolidation of Peasant Land for Large-Scale Commercial
Farming in Rural China
*Tshililo Manenzhe, Institute for Poverty, Land and Agrarian Studies (PLAAS), University of
the Western Cape, South Africa, Land reform, large-scale commercial agriculture and the
agrarian question of labour in the Levubu Valley, Limpopo Province, South Africa
*Adrian Sinkler, Department of Political Science, University of Washington, USA,
Accumulation by Reconversion in Southern Mexico
*Farai Mtero, Institute for Poverty, Land and Agrarian Studies (PLAAS), University of the
Western Cape, South Africa, Commercialisation and de-agrarianisation: ‘massive’ maize
production schemes and rural livelihoods in the Eastern Cape.
3
15:30 Coffee (RPCC Third Floor)
16:00 Panel session 2 (panels 6 – 10)
Panel 6: Framing the Debate: Regional Perspectives
*Chair: Carlos Oya, School of Oriental and African Studies, UK (tbc)
*Michael Levien, University of California-Berkeley, USA, The Politics of Dispossession:
Theorizing India’s “Land Wars”
*Julianne Hazlewood, Universidad San Francisco de Quito, Ecuador, “Los Gringos Comen
Gente”: Surrounding and Infiltrating Fourth World Territories via Climate Change Mitigation
Development in Ecuador’s Northwestern Pacific Frontier
*Alberto Alonso-Fradejas, International Institute of Social Studies (ISS), Netherlands / Institute
for Agrarian and Rural Studies, National Coordination of NGOs and Cooperatives (IDEARCONGCOOP), Guatemala, The Politics of Contemporary Land Control-grabbing in Guatemala
*Ben Cousins, Institute for Poverty, Land and Agrarian Studies (PLAAS), University of the
Western Cape, South Africa, Reproduction/accumulation dynamics in the wake of land grabs:
South African experiences and implications for global debates
*Ben Wisner, University College, London, Adolfo Mascarehas, LINKS, Tanzania, Charles
Bwenge, University of Florida, and Tom Smucker, Edna Wangui and Dan Weiner, Ohio
University, Let Them Eat (Maize) Cake: Climate Change Discourse, Misinformation and Land
Grabbing in Tanzania
Panel 7: Understanding the Grabbers II: Views from the “North”
*Chair: Eric Holt-Gimenez, Foodfirst / Institute for Food and Development Policy, USA
*Steven Wolf, Department of Natural Resources, Cornell University, USA, Critical analysis of
categories implicated in assessment of land grabs: An empirical perspective from the
Adirondacks in New York State, USA
*Sarah Knuth, University of California-Berkeley, USA, Global Finance and the Green Premium
*Derek Hall, Department of Political Science, Wilfrid Laurier University, Canada, Where is
Japan in the Global Land Grab Debate?
*Ward Anseeuw, CIRAD and University of Pretoria, South Africa, Mathieu Boche, CIRAD,
Tinashe Kapuya, University of Pretoria, South Africa, Stéphanie Aubin, and Ishmael Sunga,
Southern African Confederation of Agricultural Unions, Global land deals – The Case of South
African farmers investing in Africa
Panel 8: Governance II: The Importance of Local Politics
4
Chair: Ben White, International Institute of Social Studies (ISS), Netherlands
*Lauren Honig, Department of Government, Cornell University, USA, State Land Transfers and
Local Authorities in Zambia
*Irna Hofman, Institute for Area Studies, Leiden University, Netherlands, Growing rice without
water? Rural perceptions and responses to mystifying Chinese farm practices in Tajikistan
*Erwin Suryana and Dianto Bachriadi, Agrarian Resource Center (ARC), Indonesia, Land
Grabbing and Speculation for Energy Business: A Case Study of Exxon Oil Business Expansion
in Bojonegoro of East Java, Indonesia
*Festus Boamah, Department of Geography, University of Bergen, Norway, How chiefs
formalize relationship with land users in recent times: Illuminating the politics of land
dispossessions during land transactions for biofuel investments in Ghana
Panel 9: Resistance II: Collective Action In and Over Time
Chair: Alberto Alonso-Fradejas, International Institute of Social Studies, Netherlands
*Esther Mwangi, CIFOR, Indonesia, Emmanuel Luoga, Sokoine University, Joseph Bahati,
Makerere University, and Michael Gachanja, East African Society, Large-scale land acquisitions
in East Africa: Civil society and collective action for securing rights to land and forests
*Cliff Welch, History Department, Universidade Federal de São Paulo, Brazil, Resisting the
Land Grabbers in Latin America from the Cold War to the Globalization Eras
*Tapiwa Uchizi Nyasulu, Centre for Development Research (ZEF), University of Bonn,
Germany, Acts of Resistance by Farming Communities as a way of holding Traditional
Authorities Accountable in Land Administration in Ghana
*Jeanne Koopman, African Studies Center, Boston University, USA, Land Grabs, Women’s
Farming, and Women’s Activism
*Dana Graef, Anthropology and Environmental Studies. Yale University, Pathways of
Transnational Collaboration in Promoting Small-Scale and Organic Agriculture in Latin
America
Panel 10: Labor Regimes and ‘Business Models’ II: Outgrowers as the ‘Win-win’?
Chair: Ruth Hall, Institute for Poverty, Land and Agrarian Studies, South Africa
*Claudia Piacenza, University of Wageningen, Netherlands, Negotiating gender property
relations over land: oil palm production in Kalangala district, Uganda
*Christophe Gironde, Asian Studies, Graduate Institute of International and Development
Studies, Switzerland, Rubber-tree boom in Cambodia: assessing small landholders enthusiasm
5
*Alex Dubb, Institute for Poverty, Land and Agrarian Studies (PLAAS), University of the
Western Cape, South Africa, Social reproduction, accumulation and class differentiation: smallscale sugar cane growers in Mtubatuba, KwaZulu-Natal, South Africa
*Harold Liversage and Steven Jonckheere, International Fund for Agricultural Development
(IFAD), Italy, IFAD’s experience in supporting inclusive business models that secure land and
other natural resource rights
18:00 Drinks and dinner reception, book launches and publications display (Martha Van
Rensselaer Atrium, hosted by the ISS Theme Project on Land)
Thursday October 18
8:30
Breakfast (RPCC Third Floor)
9:00
Plenary: Roundtable on Methodologies: Identifying, Counting and Understanding
Land Grabs Chair: Ian Scoones (IDS)
Discussant No. 1 (tbc)
Discussant No. 2 (tbc)
Speaker from Land Matrix Partnership
Plus, others (speakers to be confirmed)
10:30 Tea/Coffee (RPCC Third Floor)
11:00 Panel session 3 (panels 11 – 15)
Panel 11: Understanding the Grabbers III: Comparative Perspectives
Chair: (tbc)
*Bernardo Mançano Fernandes, Universidade Estadual Paulista, UNESP Brazil and Elizabeth
Alice Clements, Land Grabbing, Agribusiness and the Peasantry in Brazil and Mozambique
*Ariane Goetz, Balsillie School of International Affairs, Wilfrid Laurier University, Canada,
How different are the UK and China? “Land grabbing” countries in comparative perspective
*Sukyeung Lee, International Institute of Social Studies (ISS), Netherlands, and Anders Riel
Müller, Roskilde University, Denmark, Overseas Agricultural Investment: Comprehensive
Analysis of Korean Strategy within the Global Food System
*Kian Goh, Department of Urban Studies and Planning, Massachusetts Institute of Technology,
USA, Singapore and Eco-Expansionism in the Age of Peak-Everything
Panel 12: Governance III: Territorial Control and Regulation
Chair: Sergio Sauer, Universidade de Brasília, Brazil
6
*Aaron de Grassi, Department of Geography, University of California, Berkeley, USA,
Geographies of Construction and Trajectories of Agrarian Change in Oil-Boom Angola
*Meghan Morris, Department of Anthropology, University of Chicago, USA, The Making of
Ethnic Claims to Land Restitution in Colombia
*Lucia Goldfarb, International Developments Studies, Utrecht University, Netherlands, The
frontiers of GM soya in Argentina: Opening a space for new forms of land control and land
governance
*Laureen Elgert, Social Science and Policy Studies, Worcester Polytechnic Institute, USA, The
role of commodity certification in greening the global land grab: the case of soy certification
*Matias Margulis, Department of International Studies / UNBC and Max Planck Institute for the
Study of Societies, Canada, Land Grabbing and Global Governance
Panel 13: Resistance III: Movements Gaining Momentum
Chair: Dominique Caouette, of University of Montreal, Quebec, Canada
*Bradley Wilson, Geography, West Virginia University, USA Reclaiming the People's Property:
Land Grabbing and Rural Worker Resistance in Post-Sandinista Nicaragua
*John Wilkinson and Debora Lerrer,Federal Rural University of Rio de Janeiro, Impact of
Restrictive Legislation and Popular Opposition Movements on Foreign Land Investments in
Brazil: The Case of the Forestry and Pulp Paper Sector and Stora Enso
*Dianne Rocheleau, Clark University, USA, Resistance to Green Land Grabbing: New
articulations within and between social movements in Chiapas, Mexico
*Cristián Alarcón, Department of Urban and Rural Development, Swedish University of
Agricultural Sciences and Center for Development / Environment Studies, Uppsala University,
Sweden, Peasants and wood, capitalist development of forestry and contemporary global land
grabbing: On resistance, proletarianization and the making of social-ecological movements
*Rohit Mujumdar, School of Community and Regional Planning, University of British
Columbia, Vancouver, BC Canada, The Social Ecology of Resistance to Land Grabbing: A Case
Study from India
Panel 14: Green Grabs I: Discourses and Mechanisms
Chair: Ian Scoones, Institute of Development Studies, University of Sussex, UK
*Kathleen McAfee, International Relations, San Francisco State University, USA, Selling nature
through green grabbing: discourses and resistances
7
*Karen Rignall, post-doctoral fellow, Center for Contemporary Arab Studies, Georgetown
University, USA, Theorizing sovereignty in Terra Nullius: the land tenure implications of
concentrated solar power in pre-Saharan Morocco
*Hannah Wittman, Institute for Resources, Environment and Sustainability, University of British
Columbia, Canada, Climate, Carbon, Commodification, and Crisis: Unequal exchange and the
carbonization of agriculture in the Americas
*Adrienne Johnson, Clark University, USA, Green governance or green grab? The Roundtable
on Sustainable Palm Oil (RSPO) in Ecuador
*Jennifer Tucker, University of California, Berkeley, USA, Smallholders, Speculation and
“Sustainable Soy”: Paraguay and the Global Land Grab
Panel 15: Conflict I: Conflict and Post-Conflict Grabs
*Chair: Charles Geisler, Department of Development Sociology, Cornell, USA
*Bhavani Fonseka, Centre for Policy Alternatives, Sri Lanka, State Policy and Land Issues in
Post War Sri Lanka: A Critique on Current Practices and Implications
*Eria Serwajja, Institute for Poverty, Land and Agrarian Studies (PLAAS), University of the
Western Cape, South Africa, The quest for development through dispossession: Examining
Amuru sugar industry in Lakang-Amuru district of Northern Uganda
*Ian Baird, Department of Geography, University of Wisconsin-Madison, USA, War, Political
Memories, Landscapes and Land Concessions in the Lao People’s Democratic Republic
*Stefano Ruzza, Department of Culture, Politics and Society, University of Turin (Italy),
Mapping Practices of Violent Land Grabbing
*Jairo Baquero Melo, Sociology, Freie Universität Berlin, Germany, Land grabbing and
conflicts over territories: Agro-industrial projects in Lower Atrato
12:30 Lunch (RPCC Third Floor)
14:00 Panel session 4 (panels 16 – 21)
Panel 16: Understanding the Grabbers IV: Regional and Local Actors
*Chair: Sam Moyo, African Institute of Agrarian Studies, Zimbabwe
*Lee Mackey, Department of Planning, University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA), USA,
The Green and the Gold: Brazilian Elites in the Regional Production of Ethanol Frontiers in
Latin America
8
*Marion Dixon, Department of Development Sociology, Cornell University, USA [Elites in
Egypt - title to be confirmed]
*Yang Jiao, Department of Anthropology, University of Florida, USA, Land deals by Chinese
private enterprises in Africa: A case study in Ghana
*Justa Hopma, University of Oxford, [paper title to be confirmed]
*Pablo Lapegna, Department of Sociology, University of Georgia at Athens, USA, Land Deals
in Argentina: Local, National and Global Agribusiness
Panel 17: Governance IV: Understanding the Role of the National State
Chair: Dzodzi Tsikata, University of Ghana, Ghana
*Fred Nelson, Maliasili Initiatives, Emmanuel Sulle, University of Maryland, USA,
Edward Lekaita, Ujamaa Community Resource Team, Tanzania, and Andrew Williams,
Maliasili Initiatives, Land, Voice, and the Crisis of the State in Contemporary Tanzania
*Megan MacInnes, Global Witness, Corruption and large-scale land acquisitions: an analysis of
the role high level corruption plays in enabling elite capture of land
*Colin Filer, Crawford School of Public Policy, Australian National University, Australia, The
Commission of Inquiry into Special Agricultural and Business Leases in Papua New Guinea:
Fresh Details for the Portrait of a Process of Expropriation
*Ruth Hall and Gaynor Paradza, Future Agricultures Consortium / Institute for Poverty, Land
and Agrarian Studies (PLAAS), University of the Western Cape, South Africa, Foxes Guarding
the Hen-house: The Fragmentation of ‘The State’ in Negotiations over Land Deals in Congo and
Mozambique
Panel 18: Resistance IV: Resistance and the Implications of/for Citizenship
Chair: Marc Edelman, City University of New York, USA (tbc)
*Devparna Roy, Department of Sociology and Anthropology, Hobart and William Smith
College, USA, Resistance to Land Grabs and Peasants' Practices of Citizenship in Democratic
Developmental States: Case Studies from India
*Joel Correia, Geography Department, University of Colorado, USA, Ore Yvy: Lessons From
Past Land Grabs and Their Implications on Current and Future Struggles for Indigenous
Peoples in the Paraguay-Brazil Borderlands
*Preeti Sampat, Department of Anthropology, City University of New York, The ‘Goan
Impasse’: Resistance to SEZs and Land Rights in Goa, India
9
*Andreas Neef, Global Environmental Studies, Kyoto University and Siphat Touch, Ministry of
Rural Development, Cambodia, Land Grabbing in Cambodia: Narratives, Mechanisms,
Resistance
Panel 19: Green Grab II: Conservation as Resource Grabs?
Chair: Esther Mwangi, CIFOR, Indonesia (tbc)
*Claire Bedelian, University College London / International Livestock Research Institute,
Wildlife conservancies and land leasing in the Maasai Mara, Kenya
*Alice Kelly University of California, Berkeley, USA, “Property Vacuum” Production and the
Social and Ecological Implications of Open Access in Waza National Park, Cameroon
*David Mwesigye Tumusiime, Department of Environmental Management, Makerere
University, Uganda and Espen Sjaastad, Department of International Environment and
Development Studies (Noragric), Norwegian University of Life Sciences, Norway, The Costs
and Benefits of Conservation: Consolation, Inequality, and Attitudes around Bwindi
Impenetrable National Park, Uganda
*Esteve Corbera, Institute of Environmental Science and Technology, Universitat Autònoma de
Barcelona, Spain and Adrian Martin, School of International Development, University of East
Anglia, UK, Simple principles, complex practices? Early experience of community-based
REDD+ in Tanzania
*Pablo Pacheco, CIFOR, and Jose Heder Benatti, Federal University of Para, Land
appropriation processes under changing environmental governance in the Amazon: A look at
their implications for land use and development
Panel 20: Conflict II: Violence and Narco-Grabs
Chair: tbc
*Kendra McSweeney, David Wrathall, Erik Neilsen, and Zoe Pearson, Department of
Environmental Studies, University of California, Santa Cruz, USA, Narco-trafficking
Landscapes: Drug flows as accelerants of land dispossession
*Teo Ballvé, Department of Geography, University of California, Berkeley, USA, Grassroots
Masquerades: Paramilitary Violence, Development, and Land-Laundering in Northwest
Colombia
*Jefferson Boyer, Department of Anthropology, Appalachian State University, USA, Wilfredo
Cardona, former director, Ministry of Agriculture, Honduras, and Andrés León, Department of
Anthropology, City University New York, USA, The Bloody Land Conflict in Bajo Aguán,
Honduras: peasant struggles, a compliant state, and the rise of transnational agro-industrial
biofuels
10
*Juana Davila, Social Anthropology, Harvard University, USA, Conceptualizing land grabbing
and restitution in Colombia: ethnographic notes on violent capitalism and the technocratic
imagination
Panel 21: Land Grabs and Livelihoods: Debating Impacts
*Chair: Ian Scoones, Institute of Development Studies, University of Sussex, UK
*Maru Shete, African Studies Centre, Leiden University, Netherlands, Impact of Land transfer
for Commercial Agriculture on Household Income and Food Security in Oromiya Regional
State, Ethiopia: The Case of Karaturi Global Agricultural PLC
*Lakshmi Balachandran, Elizabeth Herb, Erin O'Reilly and Shahbano Tirmizi, Columbia
University, USA, Food Security and Livelihood Impacts of Commercial Palm Oil Plantations in
Liberia
*Chris Huggins, Carleton University, Canada, Consolidating land, consolidating power: What
future for smallholder farming in Rwanda’s ‘Green Revolution’?
15:30 Tea/Coffee (RPCC Third Floor)
16:00 Plenary: Panel on ‘Beyond the Voluntary Guidelines’
Chair: Ruth Hall, Institute of Poverty, Land and Agrarian Studies, South Africa
Speakers to be confirmed: CSOs – Via Campesina and others; Multi/bilateral; Academics
18:00 Dinner in the Physical Sciences Baker Atrium and Portico, hosted by the Polson
Institute, Department of Development Sociology, Cornell University (tbc)
Friday, October 19
8:30
Breakfast (RPCC Third Floor)
9:00
Plenary: José Graziano da Silva, Director-General, UN Food and Agriculture
Organization
10:30 Tea/Coffee
11:00 Panel session 5 (panels 22 – 27)
Panel 22: Understanding the Grabbers V: The Role of Emerging Economies
*Chair: Ye Jingzhong, China Agricultural University, China (tbc)
*Giuseppina Siciliano, Department of Regional Planning, University IUAV of Venice, Italy,
Rural-urban migration and domestic land grabbing in China: drivers, impacts and trade-offs
11
*Marcos A. Pedlowski, Laboratório de Estudos do Espaço Antrópico, Centro de Ciências do
Homem,Universidade Estadual do Norte Fluminense, Brazil, Mega-projects and State-driven
Land Grabbing in Brazil: Violence and Dispossession in the Name of Economic Development
*Sudeshna Mitra, Department of City and Regional Planning, Cornell University, USA,
Contested Desires: Making Peri-urban “Global Cities” through Land Grabs in India
*Sai Balakrishnan, Urban Planning, Harvard University, USA, Land Conflicts Along Highways
in India: A Commentary on India’s Agrarian to Industrial Transition
*Joshua Muldavin, Sarah Lawrence College, USA, Land from the Tiller: China’s role in global
processes of land dispossession
Panel 23: Governance V: Governance at Multiple Levels
*Chair: Lorenzo Cotula, International Institute of Environment and Development, UK
*Laura German, University of Georgia, USA, Multi-level governance of large-scale land
acquisitions: Mapping the terrain
*Rhonda Ferguson, Irish Centre for Human Rights, National University of Ireland Galway,
Ireland, Land acquisitions and states’ right to food obligations: Potential for compatibility or
conflict?
*Mercedes Stickler, World Resources Institute, USA, Governance of Large-Scale Land
Acquisitions in Uganda: The role of the Uganda Investment Authority
*Smita Narula, School of Law, Center for Human Rights and Global Justice, USA, Contesting
the Global Land Rush: Market vs. Rights-based Approaches
Panel 24: Resistance V: Responses to Resistance / counter-strategies
Chair: Wendy Wolford, Department of Development Sociology, Cornell University, USA
*Catherine Corson, Mount Holyoke College, USA, Grabbing the Green Economy: Disabling
resistance through participatory process
*Victor Chikaipa, Chancellor College, University of Malawi, Malawi, A Critique of the
government responses on oppositions and protests over land grabs in Malawi: A Case study of
the Greek and Chinese land leases in Mangochi and Salima districts respectively
*Dian Yanuardy, Sajogyo Institute / Southeast Asia Studies, Gajah Mada University, Indonesia,
Challenging Peasant’s Reclaiming of the Commons: A Project of “Accumulation by
Dispossession” in Yogyakarta, Indonesia
*Zoe Brent, Universidad del Salvador, Argentina, Governance and resistance in Jujuy:
territorial discourses and mechanisms of land control
12
Panel 25: Gender and Social Differentiation
Chair: Ben White, International Institute of Social Studies (ISS), Netherlands
*Patience Mutopo, University of Cologne, Germany, University of Wageningen, Netherlands
and Ruzivo Trust, Zimbabwe, and Manase Chiweshe, Future Agricultures Consortium / Institute
of Development Studies, University of Sussex, UK, Large Scale Land Deals and the Politics of
Livelihoods: Experiences of Women Small- Holder Farmers in Chisumbanje, Zimbabwe
*Randi Kaarhus, Department of International Environment and Development Studies (Noragric),
Norwegian University of Life Sciences, Norway, If women’s land rights are not “real” property
rights? Land deals in northern Mozambique
*Jean Lee, University of Vermont, USA [paper title tbc]
*Nidhi Tandon (Networked Intelligence), Marc Wegerif (Oxfam GB), Patience Mutopo, Prosper
Ngowi (Mzumbe University), and Abena Boateng, Rural Women and Corporate Land
Investments in Africa
Panel 26: Historical Understandings and Lessons of Land Grabbing
*Chair: tbc
*Liz Alden Wily, Independent scholar, Towards the New Colonialism? Trajectories of Land
Rushes in Africa
*Jennifer Bair, Department of Sociology, University of Colorado Boulder, and
Phillip Hough, Florida Atlantic University, USA, The Developmental Origins of Neoliberal Land
Grabs: Land, Livelihoods and Dispossession in Mexico and Colombia
*Ernest Molua, Department of Agricultural Economics and Agribusiness, University of Buea,
Assoua Eyong Joe and Grace Limunga Sama, Centre for Independent Development Research,
Cameroon, Economics of Colonial and Contemporary Land Grab in Cameroon: Contextual
Impacts of Agrarian Capitalism on Labour Supply and Livelihoods
*Upik Djalins, Department of Development Sociology, Cornell University, USA, Lessons
Learned from a Colonial Land Grab in Banjoewangi, East Java, 1909-1939
Panel 27: Justifying Land Deals: Policy Narratives
Chair: Fouad Makki, Department of Development Sociology, Cornell University, USA
*John Galaty, Department of Anthropology, McGill University, Canada, ‘Unused’ Land and
Unfulfilled Promises: Justifications for Displacing Communities in East Africa
*Heather Plumridge Bedi, University of Cambridge, UK, UN Special Rapporteurs, Human
Rights, and Food Insecurity: Contesting Agricultural Land Grabbing for Coal Mining in
Phulbari, Bangladesh
13
*Jennifer Baka, Yale School of Forestry and Environmental Studies, USA, Unpacking the
Waste: A History of Wasteland Politics in India
*Mindi Schneider, Department of Development Sociology, Cornell University, USA, “We will
feed ourselves!” Food Security Politics in Post-Reform China
*William G. Moseley, Macalester College, China’s Green Revolution Narrative and Its
Implications for African Agricultural Development
12:30 Lunch (RPCC Third Floor)
14:00 Panel session 6 (panels 28 – 33)
Panel 28: Governance VI: Land Administration and Tenure Reforms
*Chair: Ryan Isakson, University of Toronto, Canada
*Michael Dwyer, Centre for Development and Environment, University of Bern, Switzerland,
The formalization fix? Land titling, agribusiness concessions and geographical transparency in
contemporary Cambodia
*Julian Quan, Natural Resources Institute, University of Greenwich UK / Mozambique
Community Lands Initiative (iTC), Policy and institutional challenges in land rights security
and management of land investment in Mozambique
*Liza Grandia, Department of Native American Studies, University of California-Davis, USA,
and Bayron Milian, University of San Carlos-Petén, Guatemala, Policy Grab: Evaluating Land
Administration Projects in Petén, Guatemala
Panel 29: Resistance VI: Scaling up Resistance / Transnational Resistance
Chair: Jun Borras, International Institute of Social Studies (ISS), Netherlands
*Emily Polack and Lorenzo Cotula, International Institute for Environment and Development
(IIED), UK, Resistance Ready: Under what conditions can citizens achieve justice and equitable
outcomes in the context of the global land rush?
*Paulette Nonfodji, University of Amsterdam, Netherlands, Small Farm Holders’ Response to
Global Land Rush in Benin: Linkages of international solidarity between civil societies
*Leah Temper and Joan Martinez Alier, Autonomous University of Barcelona, Spain,
Mapping resistance to the global landgrab: definitions, financial activism and alliances
*LaShandra Sullivan, Department of Anthropology, University of Chicago, USA, ‘Occupying’
Agribusiness: Land Protest Camps and Third Party Labor Contractors in Mato Grosso do Sul,
Brazil
Panel 30: Uncovering Resource Grabs: Water
14
*Chair: Raymond Craib, Cornell University, USA (tbc)
*Anders Jägerskog, Stockholm International Water Institute, Sweden, Land Acquisitions and
transboundary waters?
*Amandine Adamczewski Amandin, Thomas Hertzog, Jean-Yves Jamin, Jean-Christophe
Poussin, Jean-Philippe Tonneau, CIRAD, France, How land grabbing overturns the governance
of irrigated areas in Mali? State, Donors, Farmers seeks to find their roles
*Tewodros Assefa, Antalya University, Turkey, and Kathleen Guillozet, University of
California, Davis, USA, Using Crop Water Footprints to Estimate the Water Resource
Implications of Land Deals in Ethiopia
*Alejandro Camargo, Department of Geography, Syracuse University, USA, Water Grabbing:
Wetlands Conservation, Contragovernmentality, and the Violence of Property in Colombia
*Lyla Mehta, Institute of Development Studies, University of Sussex, UK, Gert Jan Velwisch,
Wageningen University and Jennifer Franco, Transnational Institute [title to be confirmed]
Panel 31: Underlying Resource Grabs: Mining
*Chair: Tony Bebbington, School of Geography, Clarke University, USA (tbc)
*Markus Kröger, University of California, Berkeley / University of Helsinki, Finland, Iron
Mines and the Forging of Contentious Agency in India and Brazil
*Debbie Becher, Department of Sociology, Barnard College, Columbia University, USA, Value
Brokerage: American Struggles over Fracking Rights
*Spencer Schwartz, Industrial Labor Relations, Cornell University, USA, Corporate Coercion
and the Use of Force in Global Land Grabs
*Muriel Côte, Institute of Geography, University of Edinburgh, UK, What's in a right? A case of
land governance at the intersection of neo-liberalisation and decentralisation in the gold mining
sector of Burkina Faso
*David Fig, Environmental Evaluation Unit, University of Cape Town, South Africa, Extraction
and displacement: the potential social and environmental impacts of hydraulic fracturing in
South Africa
Panel 32: Laying the Groundwork for Land Deals: Infrastructure
Chair: Sara Pritchard, Cornell University, USA (tbc)
*Sonia Arellano-López, Institute of Global Cultural Studies (IGCS), USA, Conflicting land use
agendas: environment, indigenous land rights and development in central Bolivia. The case of
the Isiboro-Sécure Indigenous Territory and National Park (TIPNIS)
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*Abdirizak Nunow, Future Agricultures Consortium / Inter-Parliamentary Union of IGAD (IPUIGAD), Ethiopia, Displacement and Dispossession of the Boni Community: The Kenya
Government Dilemma on the New Port of Lamu
*Jeremy Campbell, Anthropology Department, Roger Williams University, USA, The Future is
Priceless: Land Grabbing as a Speculative Encounter with Governance in the Brazilian Amazon
*Jia Ching Chen, City and Regional Planning and Global Metropolitan Studies, University of
California, Berkeley, USA, Solar Farms and Carbon Credit Forests: New Land Enclosures,
Natural Capital and Rural Transformation in China
Panel 33: Grabs in the North
*Chair: Rosanne Rutten, University of Amsterdam, Netherlands (tbc)
*Natalia Mamonova, Institute of Social Studies, Rotterdam, Netherlands Black Earth, Red
Barons, ‘Green’ Investors and Grey Communities
*Oane Visser and Michelle Steggerda, Department of Anthropology and Development Studies,
Radboud University, Netherlands, Abandoned land, megafarms and interaction between
investors and rural communities in Russian agriculture
*David Kay, Department of Development Sociology, Cornell University, USA, Natural Gas
Development in the United States: A Land Grab? Too Far a Reach?
15:30 tea/coffee
16:00 Plenary V: Concluding Conversation
Chair: Ben White, International Institute of Social Studies (ISS), Netherlands
Ian Scoones, Institute of Development Studies, UK
Dzodzi Tsikata, University of Ghana, Ghana
Via Campesina (speaker to be confirmed)
Short presentations from different perspectives: what have we learned, what action do we need to
take?
17:30 Closing remarks and thanks
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