1. POLITICAL ECONOMY ANALYSIS OF LAND REFORMS IN MALAWI SINCE 1994 A PAPER PRESENTED AT THE URBAN NET MEETING ON OCTOBER 2, 2014 ( Held At Action Aid Malawi in Lilongwe) By Harun Juma Email: hassanaubi@gmail.com

2. WHY DO WE NEED A LAND REFORM IN MALAWI  Agriculture is a major source of livelihood in rural areas & a tool for economic growth and poverty reduction in  More than 80% of Malawians earn their livelihoods from agriculture  55% of smallholder farmers cultivate less than a hectare  Yet 30,000 estates are cultivating between 10 to 500 hectares.  And about 28% of the country’s cultivable arable land (about 2.6 million hectares) under freehold, lies idle in the rural areas  Strong land laws will help to facilitate proper urban development

3. WHY ANALYSIS FROM 1994  1994 democratization was a critical juncture offering some policy windows – e.g. Land reform  Most Malawian had the expectations that the question of land will be solved completely  Political parties used land reform as a campaign tool

4. WHAT HAPPENED AFTER 1994?  Land reform was initiated by the UDF government (1994)  It passed on to the DDP led government in (2004-2009)  To the PP led government (2009-2014)  Today is almost 20 years in Democracy and nothing tangible has happened!  A land bill was just passed last year (Land Bill 2013)

5. WHY IS LAND REFORM STILL HANGING?  It is because of lack of political will?  No? Its beyond political Will  We need to do a political economy analysis

6. WHAT IS POLITICAL ECONOMY  Political economy analysis focuses on the interaction between politics and economics.  It examines the influence of economics and politics in development interventions Politics: power and distribution of resources Economics: production, allocation and consumption

7. LAND REFORM PROCESS NATURE OF REFORM: Pro Poor Or Pro rich Stakeholders & Interests Are actors: Politicians, Estate owners, The state, chiefs, NGOs, investors, local people Power & Politics Which actor has more power? How is that power used? How can we negotiate that power? Institutions Rules of the game: formal and informal Limits the actions of actors in reform

8. IMPLICATIONS OF LACK OF LAND REFOMS ON URBAN DEVELOPMENT  Scarcity of land in rural areas is a push factor for people to migrate to urban areas - a livelihood coping strategy >> congested settlements  There is a link between the nature of laws governing land and infrastructure being developed >>poor tenure systems is one of the factors hindering the efficient growth of cities in developing countries- Dawall and Clarke

9.  Poor settlements promotes inefficient land use and accelerates land scarcity issues in urban areas  Vulnerability: Unsecure land rights especially among urban poor - Cont’d

11. CONCLUSION Land reform in Malawi is caught in competing objectives between the state and private sector on one hand and local communities on the other The poor man and the poor woman are the losers Most importantly the prospects of a well planned urban development are being stifled

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