World Bank to stop abusing the right to land

Around the world peasants, pastoralists, indigenous peoples, fisher-folk, women and local communities in rural and urban areas face increasing pressures of displacement and dispossession because of destructive investments, armed conflicts and environmental destruction.

In response to these threats, peoples' movements and civil society organizations have joined hands in a statement to articulate common demands for equitable and sustainable access to and control over land, water, biodiversity and natural resources for food production. The FAO Guidelines on Responsible Tenure of Land, Fisheries and Forests (Tenure Guidelines) are a major milestone in this regard and the result of many years of social mobilization.

The collective statement argues the World Bank's policies and operations are serious threats to the human rights and livelihoods of the very people that the Tenure Guidelines seek to protect, and demands coherence of the policies and actions of governments, the World Bank and other International Financial Institutions with the Tenure Guidelines and internationally recognized human rights, which must be put on the monitoring agenda of the Committee for World Food Security.

Read below full statement