Land registration is vital for sustainable farming, helping people earn a living and reducing poverty. In Mozambique, 95% of rural communities lack access to land registration, leading to land disputes, worsened by extractive industries like mining. These industries take land from local communities and do not share the profits despite legal requirements. Many communities are unaware of how to claim their share or manage funds, often relying on civil society organisations.

Switzerland’s engagement in land governance started in 2010 with the Land Use Rights programme, which was implemented until 2022. The first two phases focused on land titling in line with the central government’s approach. In the third phase, while the goal of securing access to land for communities remained the same, the evolution of the context led to a shift of the programme’s focus towards strengthening civil society organisations active in land conflict mitigation. The programme also developed a strong policy engagement component and, in the last three years, supported the Ministry of Land and Environment in the design of the new land policy and revision of the land law.

The new project will continue to improve land governance and help local authorities manage resources effectively.

Outcome 1: District governments have developed and are able to manage a participatory land management system.

Outcome 2: Communities are able to make use of their share of benefits from the extractive industry and forest and wildlife resources.

Outcome 3: Local justice actors are able to actively apply the legal framework on land rights and natural resources in defence of the users.

Principaux résultats attendus:  

• Increase in number of families and community members who possess a land certificate or title.
• Decrease in reported cases of land disputes between local communities and investors involved in landbased investment projects.
• Increase in the revenue received by communities from fiscal revenues collected from the use of forest and wildlife resources (20%) and mining (2.75%) as well as from land and natural resources stewardship.
• Increase in the number of land investments made by both communities and individual families, particularly those led by women and youth.

Principaux résultats antérieurs:  

Contribution of Land Use Rights programme - Phase III (2018/22)

• The capacities of the judicial sector on land governance were improved as about 1,200 judges and paralegals were trained.
• 55 Community Funds established through which communities were granted approximatively CHF 150,000 from the Government for local community development initiatives.
• More than 1,000 land dispute cases were listed in the northern provinces of Mozambique, of which 200 were submitted to court which resulted in at least 30 successful decisions in favour of the local communities.
• The litigation approach aimed at protecting the rights of communities and the experience with the new land titling approach based on a participative community land delimitation process were both integrated in the new Land Policy (approved in 2022).

SDC: secure land titling for local farmers (PROMAS), improve local district capacity to manage land (D4ID), solve land conflicts (Social Cohesion), create job opportunity based on the use of land (SIM) and Transformative Land Investment projects.

Public Sector: land titling (Ministries of Agriculture), community funds financial mechanism (Ministry of Finance), land conflict resolutions (Ministry of Justice), land and natural resource management (Provincial Governor and Assembly, Local State Agencies and Judicial Sector).