Debate over the phenomenon of land grabbing under the perspective of Latin America and the Caribbean. Presented at Internazionale a Ferrara in oct 2013. Vitor Bukvar Fernandes

1. Land grab in Latin
America
Vitor Bukvar Fernandes
Economic Development PhD
candidate and researcher at
University of Campinas, Brazil
(Unicamp)

2. Overview
1.
Recent land grabs in the global context
1.
2.
2.
Convergence of global crises and land grab
Land grab as a catch-all phrase
Land grabs in Latin America and the Caribbean
1.
2.
General characteristics of the land grab in the region
3.
3.
Some numbers on the region
Recent localized problems
Conclusions and possible ways forward

3. 1. Recent land grabs and
the global context
1.1. Drivers of the land grab:
 There is a convergence of global crises since 20072008:
 Financial
 Environmental
 Energy
 Food
 This led to a dramatic revaluation of land, especially in
the global South.
 The convergence of „peak oil‟, anthropogenic climate
change and persistent hunger are located within
capital‟s
need
for
continuous
expanded
accumulation. (Borras and Franco, 2013)

4. 1. Recent land grabs and
the global context
1.2. Land grab as a “catch-all phrase”
 “Global land grab” has emerged as a catch-all
phrase that refers to transnational land transactions
and land speculation in recent years, mainly around
the large-scale production and export of food and
biofuels.
 Speaking loosely, there are 3 positions on land grabs:
1.
Regulate to facilitate
2.
Regulate to mitigate negative impacts and maximize
opportunities
3.
Regulate to block and rollback land grabbing
 There are some positions representing the extremes
(World Bank, Via Campesina, for example), but the
majority is somewhere in between the first and the last
positions.

5. 1. Recent land grabs and
the global context
 “What we have at the moment and what we are likely
to witness in the future is a three-way political battle to
control the character, parameters, and trajectory of
discourse, as well as the instruments in and the
practice of global governance of land grabbing.”
(Borras, Franco and Wang, 2013:175)

6. 2. Land grabs in Latin
America and the Caribbean
2.1. Some numbers on the region
 Population (2012): 581.4 million.
 Urban population (% of population, 2012): 79%.
 Surface area (2011): 1,946.08 million ha.
 Forest area (2011): 923.97 million ha or 48.1% of land area.
 Agricultural land (2011): 709.32 million ha or 36.9% of land area.
 Global land grabbed:
 Oxfam (2011) estimates 227 million hectares (70% in Africa).
 International Land Coalition (ILC, 2011) estimates 80 million
hectares.
 World Bank (2010) estimates 45 million hectares.
 Harvested area of flex crops (South America only):
 In 2000 - 24 million ha of soya, 6 million ha of sugarcane, 0,35 million of
oilpalm.
 In 2009 – 42 million ha of soya, 10 million of sugarcane, 0,5 million of
oilpalm.

7. 2.2. General characteristics of the land
grab in Latin America and the Caribbean
 The four common dimensions of the land grab are
present in the region (food production, biofuels, other
climate change mitigation and speculative capital).
 These are the motives for the popularity of investment in
“flex-crops”.
 The actors in land grabbing under the spotlight in Africa
(China, India, South Korea, Gulf States) have marginal
presence in Latin America.
 Land grabbing (by foreigners) and expulsion of people
from their lands:
 Occurs in pockets of expulsions, but the scale of them is
relatively low.
 Incorporation of rural labourers into the emerging
commercial farms, commodity chain, and industrial
plantations are more common.
 In most countries exploitation by foreigners is not
acceptable but exploitation of the rural workers by the
domestic elites (landlords and capitalists) is tolerated.

8. 2.2. General characteristics of the land
grab in Latin America and the Caribbean
• Results of the Food and Agriculture Organization
studies for Latin America and the Caribbean:
Source: FAO,
2011. Compiled
by Borras et al,
2012.

9. 2.2. General characteristics of the land
grab in Latin America and the Caribbean
 FAO studies in the region (concluded in late 2011):
 Definition of land grab is too restrictive - they used 3 criteria
of analysis:
 recent large-scale land acquisitions (1000 ha+);
 involvement of foreign governments in these land deals;
 negative impact of such land investments on food security of
the recipient country.
 According to these definitions:
 Land grab occurs only in Brazil and Argentina.
 There were no negative impacts on food security.

10. 2.2. General characteristics of the land
grab in Latin America and the Caribbean
 Borras et al (2012) used the same data produced by
the FAO studies but widened the definitions:
 Land grab as “control grab” (grabbing the power to
control land and other associated resources).
 Land grab as large-scale transactions (scale of land
acquisitions and/or scale of capital involved) – includes
purchase, lease, forest conservation, etc.
 Historical specificity of the actual land grabs are the
focus on “flex-crops”.

11. 2.2. General characteristics of the land
grab in Latin America and the Caribbean
• The different results found by the cited authors:
Source: Borras et al, 2012.

12. 2.2. General characteristics of the land
grab in Latin America and the Caribbean
 High intensity of land grab:
 Occurring in 10 countries in Latin America and the
Caribbean.
 “Land grabbed land grabbers”:
 Argentina, Brazil, Chile, Colombia, Panama, Mexico and
Costa Rica have major land investors into other countries
in Latin America.
 Strong inter-regional character of the land grabbing:
 Trans-Latin American Corporations (TLCs) are of two
types: single origin (Latin American) or an alliance of 2+
nationals (Trans-Latin American).
 These studies show that investors do not “always look
for marginal, empty lands” as in World Bank (2010).
 Instead they tend to go where there are existing
productive lands with water supply and transport
infrastructure.

13. 3. Some recent examples of
localized land grab problems
 Expansion of oil palm in Colombia linked to
dispossession by paramilitary activities in contested
lands. (Ballvè, 2011; Grajales 2011)
 Brazilian-based companies grabbing land in
Colombia. (Mackey, 2011)
 Brazilian and Argentinean natural and juridical persons
buying or leasing lands in Paraguay is creating
recurring tension between them and the locals.
(Galeano, 2012)
 A large land grab is currently underway in the state of
Piauí, Brazil – approximately 3 million hectares of which
1 has already been grabbed in the last 2 years, by
foreign and national players. (field research, 2013)

14. 3. Conclusions and possible
ways forward
 “Land grab” is a way too general term, when used it
should be precisely defined to avoid
misunderstandings.
 The media tend to associate the “land grab”
phenomenon with speculative movements by
financial capital, or with food-security strategies
(capital-rich, resource-poor countries grabbing land in
capital-poor, resource-rich countries).
 The Latin American case shows that these are not the
only drivers of the global land rush, there are at least
four key drivers for the land grabs:
 Food security initiatives,
 Energy/fuel security ventures,
 Other climate change mitigation strategies
 Resource demands from newer hubs of global capital.

15. 3. Conclusions and possible
ways forward
 Land is, at the same time, a speculative and productive
asset – thus, land policies need to be directed toward
the regulation of unbridled speculation with land
instead of attempting to repress or prevent it outright.
 The global land rush can be very dangerous to the rural
poor if not controlled, thus:
 Urgent responses are needed because of its impacts
 But, at the same time, a focus on non-rushed, deep
empirical research is also needed given the poor reliability
of the current datasets.
 The focus on land in the “land grab” is problematic - it
should also include the scale/intensity of capital
invested.
 The next step to a more comprehensive analysis of the
phenomena is studying the relation of the large land
deals and the terms of incorporation of the rural workers
(adverse, favorable, somewhere in between, etc).

16.  Literature cited and used:
Ballvè, T., (2011). Territory by Dispossession:
Decentralization, Statehood, and The Narco
Land-Grab in Colombia, http://www.iss.nl/ldpi.
Mackey, L., 2011. Legitimating Foreignization in
Bolivia: Brazilian Agriculture and the Relations
of Conflict and Consent in Santa Cruz, Bolivia,
http://www.iss.nl/ldpi.
Borras, S.; Franco, J. (2012). Global land grabbing
and trajectories of agrarian change: a preliminary
analysis. Journal of Agrarian Change, vol. 12, no.
1, Jan. 2012, pp. 34-59.
Oya, C. (2013). Methodological reflections on
„land grab‟ databases and the „land grab‟
literature „rush‟, The Journal of Peasant Studies,
40:3,
503-520,
DOI:
10.1080/03066150.2013.799465.
Borras, S.; Franco, J.; Gómez, S.; Kay, C.; Spoor, M.
(2012). Land Grabbing in Latin America and the
Caribbean. The Journal of Peasant Studies, vol.
39, n. 3-4, July-October 2012, 845-872.
Urioste, M. (2012). Concentration and
„foreignization‟ of land in Bolivia, Canadian
Journal of Development Studies, 33(4), pp. 439–
457.
Deininger, K. (2011). Forum on global land
grabbing: challenges posed by the new wave of
farmland investment. Journal of Peasant Studies,
38(2), 217–47.
Wilkinson, J; Reydon, B.P.; di Sabbato, A.
(2010). Dinâmica do Mercado de terras na
América Latina: o caso do Brasil. FAO. 2010.
Galeano, L. (2012). Paraguay and the expansion
of the Brazilian and Argentinian agribusiness
frontiers, Canadian Journal of Development
Studies, 33(4), pp. 458–470.
Wilkinson, J., Reydon, B., di Sabbato, A. (2012).
Concentration and foreign ownership of land
in Brazil in the context of global land grabbing
phenomenon,
Canadian
Journal
of
Development Studies, 33(4), pp. 417–438.
Grajales, J., (2011). „The Rifle and the Title:
Paramilitary Violence and Land Control in
Colombia‟. Journal of Peasant Studies, 38 (4):
771–92.
World Bank. (2010). Rising global interest in
farmland: can it yield sustainable and
equitable benefits?. Washington DC: World
Bank.
Highquest Partners. (2010). Private Financial
Sector Investment in Farmland and Agricultural
Infrastructure. New York: HighQuest Partners.
Collected
on
January,
2013
at:
http://www.oecd.org/officialdocuments/publicdis
playdocumentpdf/?cote=TAD/CA/APM/WP(2010
)11/FINAL&docLanguage=En
World Bank. (2011). Migration and Remittances
Factbook 2011.