1.
Land and Conflict
UN-Habitat & Min. Foreign
Affairs, France
5.10.2017

2.
Key issues, challenges and opportunities
• The VGGTs are still largely unknown and unused by governments and partners
in contexts affected by conflict.
• The key land and conflict issues: illegal exploitation of natural resources,
capture of land by the elites and concentration of productive land in the hands
of a few, large scale land grabbing, creation of antagonist dynamics among
different communities/ groups, increase human density on scarce land,
legitimacy of the state is largely linked to good land administration.
• VGGTs and good land governance concepts and practices are still largely
unfamiliar to governmental and non-governmental organisations working in
some contexts.

3.
Main lessons learned/recommendations
• The VGGTs and good land governance have a key role to play in all the stages of the conflict cycle, from prevention,
to recovery, reconstruction, peace building and development. Good land governance is a key factor in creating
resilient societies and in contributing to the prevention of violent conflicts. Many land issues arise in times of
emergency and should be addressed to avoid that crises become protracted. Lastly, good land governance is a
cornerstone for early recovery and socio-economic development
• For sustaining peace, it is important to include land-issues in peace agreements and the VGGTs have a role to play in
this.
• The VGGTs have been instrumental in countries emerging from conflict to broaden existing land governance
interventions at country level, including elements of awareness, capacity development, multi-stakeholder dialogue,
and fostering institutional and policy debate on land governance.
• VGGTs are having an empowering effect on different stakeholders working on governance at country level, resulting
in the broadening of the land governance debate beyond governments only. This happens at national and local level.
• The VGGTs are important in conflict-affected contexts because they table principles of legitimate tenure rights that
reduce some antagonism around formal and customary systems and reinforce the principle of restitution.

4.
Next steps – the way forward
• 1. Elevate the issue of conflict in the international debate (member
states, international organisations, key stakeholders) by sharing well
structure information on the relation between land and conflict and
develop a clearer narrative on the VGGTs in the contexts of land and
conflict (also for stakeholders operating in emergency operations).
• 2. Establish a common agenda with key steps on land and conflict for the
coming years, also building on the UN reform process and on the work
of the CFS.
• 3. Strengthen the gender dimension of the land and conflict in the
debate and operations