Governing livelihood and land use transitions: the role of customary tenure in southeastern Morocco Dr. Karen Rignall Dr. Yoko Kusunose College of Agriculture, Food and Environment University of Kentucky 03-07: Research on Land Policies and Structural Transformation I Tuesday, March 15, 2016 Land and Poverty Conference: Scaling up Responsible Land Governance Washington, DC, March 14-18, 2016

How do customary land tenure systems manage livelihood and land use transitions? Arid lands, extensive pastoralism, and the shift to diversified, wage-based livelihoods and cultivation Pluralism in tenure regimes and the governance of transition Research questions: 1.How has the livelihood transition over the past 60 years affected land use patterns in the Mgoun valley of Morocco? 2.How have customary tenure regimes shaped livelihood transition and land use at the regional level? 3.How has the continued importance of customary tenure affected agricultural and land use strategies at the household level?

Summary of findings Marked shift from extensive pastoralism to other land uses and livelihoods over the past 50 years Customary tenure regimes shape household livelihood and land use strategies by: 1.Allowing for intraregional population movements 2.Regulating who accedes to native land rights, limiting access to agricultural land

Study area Study Area: Pre-saharan oasis, southeast Morocco

The Mgoun valley Oasis valley surrounded by arid steppe Economic and political marginalization Chronic poverty, migration and diversification

Livelihood and land use transition Movement out of extensive pastoralism Regional population movements Land use transition to housing and cultivation

Plural tenure regimes Customary tenures regimes for collective and private property Linked with other forms of natural resource governance Acquiring new relevance with land use and livelihood transitions Native versus non-native status

Data and methods 15 months ethnographic fieldwork Household survey conducted in spring/summer 2014 by authors – 306 households in bothoasis and steppe communities – 18 villages – household randomly selected within communities Data: – 1960: major assets, demographics, livelihoods and land uses – 2014: major assets, demographics, livelihoods, land uses, income sources, migration histories, agricultural production

Results and discussion Nature and extent of livelihood transition How customary tenure shaped differential experience of native and non-native households Implications of the continued importance of customary tenure

Extent and nature of livelihood transition

VariableNativeNon-native ASSETS land (acher**)12.40*6.78 animals (head sheep, goat, cattle) fruit and nut trees irrigated land (acher) members completing middle school1.08*0.55 owns vehicle (binary) * LIVELIHOOD ACTIVITIES agriculture, any (binary) * sharecrop and/or wage ag. work (binary) * agricultural labor exchange (binary) marketed agricultural products (bin.) * owns any animals (bin.) owns any fruit/nut trees (bin.) owns any irrigated land (bin.) any off-farm wage work (bin.)0.91 * any day laborers (bin.) any skilled workers (bin.)0.21*0.08 any teachers, professionals, or officials (bin.) owns a business (bin.)0.12 any remittances from intl migrants (bin.)0.19*0.11* INCOME ( ) value of agricultural production (Dh.) * agricultural wage income (Dh.) * in-kind ag income – labor sharing (Dh.) remittances (Dh.) non-ag. wage income (Dh.) * * Indicates significantly larger than mean of other group (95%) **An acher is a local land measure equivalent to 1/40 of a hectare Comparison of assets, livelihood activities, and income for native and non-native households

Non-native household binary status with respect to key characteristics (by land ownership, 2014) Native household binary status with respect to key characteristics (by land ownership, 2014)

Implications of the role of customary tenure in managing the land use and livelihood transition Inequitable outcomes Land “rationing” and the partial commoditization of land markets Sustaining the importance of agriculture even for households with minimal income from cultivation

Conclusions: customary land tenure and the land use/livelihood transition Facilitated land transfers and intraregional population movements while at the same time preventing full commoditization of the land market. Despite inequitable land distribution, customary management of natural resources may have contributed to sustainable agricultural expansion. Helped to sustain the central importance of agriculture in most households’ livelihoods.

Policy implications Attention to diverse scales of land governance in situations of policy impasse The risks of formal incorporation of customary tenure regimes Impact of agricultural and investment policies for land governance: rationalize incentives

17 Thank you! This research was by made possible by funding from the National Science Foundation.