![Sample our Area Studies journals, sign in here to start your access, latest two full volumes FREE to you for 14 days]({"type":"image" , "src" : "/sda/5922/TOC-Subject-Sample-2021-Area-Studies.jpg"})
Abstract
A boom in land titling has hit the outskirts of Kampala in Uganda, with the development of housing projects and new types of investments in the farm sector. Most of the new title-holders are not the tenants who used to be at the basis of the local agricultural system despite legislation officially intended to protect them. Tenant families are progressively losing their rights and trapped with insufficient land for farming. Most are today involved in both farm and non-farm activities, linking up agrarian and urban spaces, side to side with absentee urban investors. The current dynamics of the land market around Kampala contributes to deep changes in both agricultural production and social composition of the population, leading to new forms of marginalisation and rising inequalities.
Acknowledgements
This research was lead under a collaborative research programme between the French Institute of Research for Development (IRD) and Makerere University, Uganda. We are grateful to the Centre for Population and Applied Statistics (CPAS) for hosting us. We would particularly like to acknowledge the active participation of Robinson Kisaka, Goretti Nansamba, Adrian Ssesanga, Faith Atuhumuze and Nassib Mugwanya in fieldwork. All interviews were conducted in confidentiality and the names of interviewees are withheld. A first version of this article was presented in France during the conference ‘René Dumont revisité et les politiques agricoles africaines' on the 14 and 15 November 2012, Nogent-sur-Marne, France.
Disclosure statement
No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.
Notes
1. Joireman, Where There Is No Government; De Soto, The Mystery of Capital; De Soto, The Other Path.
2. Lund, Local Politics, 178.
3. Lund and Boone, “Introduction,” 6–8.
4. Juul and Lund, “Negociating Property,” 5.
5. Name voluntarily withheld.
6. Calas, Kampala.
7. Kibirige, The Hills of Kampala, 3.
8. Hanson, Landed Obligation.
9. Mugambwa, Principles of Land Law.
10. Olivier de Sardan, Anthropologie et développement; Olivier de Sardan, La rigueur du qualitatif.
11. Dufumier, Les projets de développement agricole.
12. Bertaux, Biography and Society; Miller, Researching Life Stories and Family Histories.
13. Although Mair and Wrigley noted that, in the 1920s already, the number of land titles was increasing, the present growth rate is unprecedented. Mair, An African People, 170; Wrigley, “The Changing Economic Structure,” 39.
14. Mair, An African People, 154–172; Richards, The Changing Structure, 25; Hanson, Landed Obligation, 165–202.
15. Buganda contains roughly one-quarter of the country's population today. For a historical overview of the kingdom, see Médard, Le royaume du Buganda.
16. From a theoretical perspective, mailo and freehold might be equated, since in both cases titles are issued, land rights are transferable in perpetuity and use rights might exist. For use rights in freehold tenure, see Mc Auslan, “Uganda.”
17. Singular kibanja, plural bibanja.
18. When referring to their patron–client relationship in the mailo system, we prefer to use these terms (‘tenants’ and ‘landlords’). However, when referring to present time dynamics, we choose to use ‘plot-holder’ and ‘title-holder’. On a theoretical level, taking into account local context, this distinction might be used for Uganda as a whole, with the on-going promotion of land titles on land that is already in use. Médard et al., “Land Policy Brief.”
19. This principle is contained in the 1995 constitution. Mc Auslan, Bringing the Law back in, 282.
20. Manji, The Politics of Land Reform; Batunji, Land Reform.
21. One of our respondents is in this situation: he bought a kibanja from its former “tenant” in the study area (Interview B9, July 2011). Interviews with numbers only were conducted by Valérie Golaz and Claire Médard; with A or B before the number by Victoire Chalin.
22. The kibanja bought by its current tenant in 1973 contains coffee bushes and a chicken farm of 200 laying hens (Interview A39, May 2011).
23. Many of our respondents mentioned this as their own situation or talking about their relatives (Interview 7, Nov 2010; Interview 17, April 2011; Interview 33, April 2014).
24. Richards, The Changing Structure.
25. Interviews 16, April 2011 and 21, May 2011.
26. One of our respondents has an individual plot within a jointly owned kibanja (Interview B28, July 2011).
27. Golaz and Médard, “Titres de propriété.”
28. Interview B40, July 2011; Interview A4, May 2011.
29. Interview 6, October 2010. See also Golaz and Médard, “Titres de propriété.”
30. Interview 31, April 2014.
31. Interview 21, May 2011.
32. Interview 21, May 2011 and personal communication, June 2011.
33. However, it gives no indication of the fragmentation of land for plot-holders.
34. A block corresponds to the land originally granted to a dignitary of the kingdom in 1900.
35. Large-scale land grabbing is hindered in the Central region by the variety of current tenure statuses and the difficulty of altering them without political support. Médard and Golaz, “Utopies à Rakai.”
36. Unfortunately there are no recent population data for Uganda to quantify this. The population of the study area rose from roughly 4127 in 1980 to 6958 in 2002, an annual increase of 2.4% before sales of land for residential purposes began.
37. Alden Wily, “Looking Back.”
38. Musa Sapientum L. or East African Highland banana (EAHB).
39. Chastanet, Plantes et paysages.
40. Stephens, “Effects of Grass Fallow Treatments.”
41. Richards, The Changing Structure.
42. Note that the matooke sold by the roadside comes from western Uganda, where large commercial farms specialise in matooke as a cash crop.
43. Chalin, “Urbanisation.”
44. See note 41 above.
45. One respondent grazed three cows and two calves on the land of a neighbouring title-holder, in non-arable areas. Animals are tied up all day. He was afraid he would lose this right in the near future despite the good relations he currently had with the title-holder (Interview A37, May 2011).
46. Chalin, “Urbanisation.”
47. Golaz and Médard, “Titres de propriété.”
48. See note 46 above.
49. Interviews B33, B37, B41, July 2011. Note that these bibanja range from half to one hectare in size.
50. See note 46 above.
51. This applies to three of the survey farms. Interviews B26, B30, July 2011. Interview A37, May 2011.
52. Interview B24, July 2011.
53. Interview A20, April 2011.
54. NAADS, “National Agricultural Advisory Service.”
55. See note 46 above.
56. Médard, “Croissance et déclin.”