News & Events

The main component of water reforms in South Africa, redressing the racial injustice of the past in existing and all new future water allocations, has failed to materialise. Ramsha will argue that the emergence of a strong Global Production Network (GPN) of citrus export at the time of rolling out of the water reforms has, and continues to have, contributed…

Abstract This thesis analyses Mexican coffee policies during the administration of President Andrés Manuel López Obrador (AMLO). It builds on approaches of state theories, agrarian political economy, and global value chain studies, and contributes to debates regarding the role of the state in small farmers’ livelihoods. The thesis is based on a case study analysing the implementation of rural policies…

Taking Back the Commons: Decommodification, Deconcentration, and Democratisation Ruth Hall and Moenieba Isaacs Institute for Poverty, Land and Agrarian Studies (PLAAS), University of the Western Cape South AfricaAbstract The battle is on for Africa’s commons, but not all is lost. Beyond the onslaught of corporate, elite and state-backed land and resource grabbing that is rampant across the continent, this talk…

The digital revolution in global agriculture has begun and this includes digital tech in African agriculture. We now see the use of a variety of digital tools on the continent, such as drones, precision farming machinery, digital decision-making support tools, digital labor management tools or online food and agricultural input marketplaces. Even though the digital revolution is still at an…

Tuesday, 13 June 2023, 13h00 - 14h30 CAT Please join us for a public lecture by Professor Bina Agarwal from the Global Development Institute, University of Manchester in the United Kingdom who will be talking about ‘Obstacles to women’s land rights and ways forward: Insights from India and beyond’. Abstract Globally, for many decades (sometimes even a century) rural women…

CAPE TOWN, 05 May 2023. The Institute for Poverty, Land and Agrarian Studies (PLAAS) last week concluded another pan-African programme on the political economy of land governance, with 71 participants from 21 countries.   This short course is hosted by PLAAS at the University of the Western Cape (UWC) in collaboration with the African Land Policy Centre (ALPC), and is an…