Land and the Challenge of Sustainable Development in Ethiopia
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Land and the Challenge of Sustainable Development in Ethiopia Conference Proceedings ■ v Land and the Challenge of Sustainable Development in Ethiopia Conference Proceedings Edited by Dessalegn Rahmato Taye Assefa Forum for Social Studies Addis Ababa © 2006 Forum for Social Studies and the authors All rights reserved. Printed in Addis Ababa Address: Forum for Social Studies Te l. (251-11) 157-2990/91 P.O.Box 25864 code 1000 Fax (251-11) 157-2979 Addis Ababa E-mail: [email protected] Ethiopia www.fssethiopia.org.et ISBN 999-44-50-08-5 The opinions expressed in this publication are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the views of FSS or its Management Board. Contents Preface Dessalegn Rahmato....................................................................... v Part I Access to Land and Agrarian Class Differentiation From Heterogeneity to Homogeneity: Agrarian Class Structure in Ethiopia since the 1950s Dessalegn Rahmato....................................................................... 3 Rural Women’s Access to Land in Ethiopia Yigremew Adal.............................................................................. 19 Part II Land Transaction Recent Experiences in Land Rental Markets in Ethiopia: Impact on Equity, Efficiency and Poverty Samuel Gebreselassie.................................................................... 43 Land Transaction and Market-Oriented Production: The Case of East Shewa Zone, Ethiopia Bezabih Emana............................................................................. 83 Part III Natural Resource Management, Policy, and Economic Return Towards the Development of Differential Land Taxation in Ethiopia Daniel Kassahun........................................................................... 103 The Land Issue and Environmental Change in Ethiopia Tekie Alemu................................................................................... 129 Land Tenure and Technological Improvement in Smallholder Agriculture in Ethiopia Workn eh Negatu............................................................................ 147 Annex 1: Land Tenure Reform and Structural Transformation of the Economy: Country Experiences Getnet Alemu................................................................................. 167 Annex 2: Welcome and Opening Statements Dessalegn Rahmato (FSS)............................................................. 191 Bezabih Emana (AESE).............................................................. 192 Assefa Admassie (EEA)............................................................... 194 Annex 3: Conference Programme....................................................... 196 Preface The papers collected in this volume were first presented for public discussion in June 2005 at a conference jointly organized by the Forum for Social Studies (FSS), the Ethiopian Economic Association (EEA), and the Agricultural Economics Society of Ethiopia (AESE). FSS, which was behind the initiative for the Conference, has long recognized that broad public debate on social and economic issues is not only a basic requirement of democratic practice but also provides valuable inputs to the formulation of sound and sustainable development policies and their implementation. The issue of land rights and rights to security of holdings continues to be a significant concern to the rural population, civil society, the business community and other social sectors. The lack of progress in the last three decades in addressing some of the serious impediments to secure access rights and an efficient and dynamic land system remains a serious challenge to the development effort of the country and has been responsible, at least in part, for the agrarian crises that have been a regular feature of the 1980s and 90s. Policies for securing rights of access to land have important implications for agricultural growth and the rural economy in general as well as for environmental resource management, poverty reduction, and even human rights. While the government has shown an unwillingness to be drawn into a discussion of the land question, there has been a growing demand for broad and informed public debate on the subject from civil society and many other concerned groups. This has been accompanied by an increasing, though by no means adequate, research output from academia and independent research institutions such as the ones which organized the June Conference. A look at the references at the end of each of the papers published here gives an indication of the scope and content of the research undertaken and the choice of subjects presented for public discussion. There were two main aims behind FSS’ initiative to organize a public dialogue on the subject. The first was the need to keep the debate on the land question alive. Keeping the debate going serves many purposes, of which the following two are important from the standpoint of civil society: a) it serves as a tool of agrarian advocacy. In our circumstances, there are very few opportunities available to vi Preface civil society to undertake advocacy work in the rural areas, and thus, sustaining the debate offers an opening and a chance for weighing the options, b) it provides a useful educational platform in which knowledge and expertise relevant for policy and social reform are exchanged and made available to decision makers and the public at large. In sharp contrast to the government’s effort to close the debate, a small but growing number of civil society organizations are keen to broaden the debate, seeing the land issue not only as an economic issue but also as an important rights issue. This is a welcome development because, in this country, there has been very little advocacy work done on agrarian justice, and mobilizing peasants to claim their rights and voice their grievances is unheard of. Moreover, not only is the land issue a cross-cutting issue bearing on a wide range of development and policy problems, as noted above, but in a predominantly agrarian society such as Ethiopia, land is a critical asset and any discussion of socio-economic development will not be complete without a discussion of the nature and dynamics of the land system. On the other hand, it was becoming increasingly apparent that the quality of the existing debate is quite unsatisfactory and that the issues often presented for public dialogue or selected for research purposes are narrowly framed. Much of the debate reflects a singular concern over the subject of tenure regimes leading to a polarized argument around the issue of state versus private ownership. The government and its supporters are adamant that there is no alternative to state ownership, while some of its critics are equally convinced that private ownership is the best option available. In the process, both protagonists and opponents have ignored a wide range of subjects that are central to the land question and have more significance both for advocacy work and the development effort. This single-issue focus and uncompromising stand has not served any useful purpose; on the contrary, it has helped to impoverish the debate. It was therefore felt that there is a need to try to shift the focus and scope of the debate if civil society and the public at large are to benefit by it. This was the second aim of the initiative behind the Conference. The papers in this volume do not cover the full range of issues pertinent to the debate on the land question; they are the result of Preface v ii research findings on a limited number of selected subjects. The volume is not meant to be taken as a comprehensive work setting a new standard for the debate, but is made available to the reading public because the works are based on current research and some of them cover subjects that tend to be neglected. There are on the other hand glaring omissions: readers will not fail to notice that there is no discussion of the recent initiative of the government to address the problems of tenure insecurity, namely, land certification and registration. Be that as it may, and despite the limitations, we believe the volume will be useful to civil society organizations, researchers, graduate students and the donor community, and will contribute to the extension and improvement of the existing debate. Dessalegn Rahmato Part I Access to Land and Agrarian Class Differentiation From Heterogeneity to Homogeneity: Agrarian Class Structure in Ethiopia since the 1950s Dessalegn Rahmato Introduction Many have argued that the land system that evolved after the Derg’s radical reforms and that is still in place in the main today has a number of fundamental deficiencies. These are: a) it promotes insecurity of tenure because it allows, among other things, periodic redistribution (or at least the threat of redistribution hangs over many peasants); b) it is inefficient because it constrains land transactions and has inhibited the emergence of a dynamic land market; c) it promotes fragmentation of land and growing pressure on land resources because it discourages rural people from leaving their farms for other employment opportunities; d) it inhibits dynamic differentiation within the peasantry and the emergence o f an enterprising class', and e) it gives the state immense power over the farming population because land is state property. Critics have also noted that the existing policy does not encourage the modernization of the land system (Dessalegn 1994; Bruce, Hoben and Dessalegn 1994; Tekie 2000a,b; EEA 2002). This paper is an attempt