Lessons Learned for the Future * 100 Years of Community Land Rights in Liberia *Most of the research for this paper was done under the auspices of the Liberian Land Commission in Responsibility for the contents and presentation of findings and recommendations of this paper rests solely with the authors. Paul De Wit, hInterland Lda Caleb Stevens, World Resources Institute

Overview of Presentation Context Legal History Land Governance Issues Recommendations

Background and Context Land Use Right Potentially to be issued (has) Agricultural Concessions –AGRIC 1,140, Forest Management Contracts - FMC 2,270, Timber Sale Contracts - TSC 230, Community Forest Management Agreements – CFMA 194, Mining Concessions – MIN 113, Private Use Permits – PUP ,00 Protected Areas – PA ,00 Total % of Liberian Land Mass , %

Legal History of Formal Recognition of Community Land in Liberia 1876: First statutory recognition of community land 1905: Public Land Grant Deeds and Aboriginal Land Grant Deeds Created 1956 and 1973: Public Lands Law

Dynamics of Community Land Ownership PUPs  Intent: Individual Fee Simple Deeds Only  Actual: Community Fee Simple Deeds Community Land Institutions  Pre-1956 Fee Simple Community Deeds  Mostly issued to chiefdoms  PUPs from 2009 onwards  Issued to various institutions

Community Land Rights in Today’s Liberia FDA data 2007 (hectares) FDA PUP data (hectares) Total (hectares) Public Land Sale Deeds 844,188156,5001,000,688 Aboriginal Land Grant Deeds 422,7281,609,5302,032,258 Total 3,032,946 hectares or 31.6% of Liberia´s land mass

Land Use Planning in the Forestry Sector Designating Land for Different Forest Uses in  Assumption land was public land  Not evidence-based  Protected Areas overlapped with fee simple deeded community land Allocation of Forest Management Contracts  Land must be public land  1,069,485 hectares allocated for FMCs are on deeded community land

Land Use Planning in the Agricultural Sector Agricultural concessions granted on piece-meal basis Government contracts that land is unencumbered by either customary or statutory land rights

Land Use Planning in the Agricultural Sector Blue = Golden Veroleum Concession in Sinoe County Yellow = Fee Simple Deeded Community Land Yellow Stripe = Overlap

Land and Natural Resource Administration Irregularities related to PUPs  Validation of deeds by the Ministry of Lands, Mines, and Energy (MLME)  “Certifications of correction” issued by MLME  Surveyors altered metes and bounds on deeds

Land and Natural Resource Governance by Communities Dubious community institutions created for PUPs  District Forest Management Committees PUPs issued without community institutions  District Commissioners and Chiefs issued PUPs Elite Capture  Case of Geetroh Community Forest Management Organization

Recommendations Creation of Land Governance Institution Land Administration Law Multi-Stakeholder Working Group on Concessions Land Use Policy Transparency of land documents