Safe and Inclusive Land Management and Administration in Mozambique: Capacity Building of National and Provincial Authorities

Client – National Directorate of Land and Forestry (DNTF)
Location – Mozambique
Year – 2014  -2018
Time – 4 years in development

Verde Azul is implementing a Land Management and Administration Program in Mozambique. This project started in 2014 and will end in 2018, with a continuous duration of 5 years.

Gesterra is designed to provide ongoing support to some of the activities launched by the “Access to Land” of the MCA project in which Verde Azul was a key player (the MCA project ended in late 2013).

A key objective of this program is to reinforce DINAT (ex-DNTF) in its role as a coordinating organization in land management and administration, and maintaining the National Land Registry (CNT).

This project has the following components:

• Improve land management at the Land Consultative Forum, district land authorities (SPGC) and National Land Authorities (DNTF). It is intended that the delimitation of lands, land tenure regularization and spatial planning are processes planned and developed at the local level and with investment promotion services;
• Consolidate land administration and build the national land registry, expanding the provision of land management services to the ten provinces of Mozambique.

The aim / outcome of the program is to improve the national capacity to provide sustainable land governance and to promote an integrated vision of land administration and management / use that responds to the needs of all land users, providing clear and secure rights (DUAT) that they can facilitate new investment choices and decisions and improve food security.

Production and Banana in Northern Mozambique: Compensation and Resettlement Plan

Client – ENICA
Location – Cabo-Delgado – Mozambique
Year – 2012
Time – 5 months

Verde Azul assisted a team of Mozambican investors in the banana agro-industry area – Enica, to prepare a Resettlement Plan for the first 1000 hectares planned as their cultivation areas.

The results included the analysis of the socioeconomic profile of the affected families, as well as the preparation of the resettlement plan and the resettlement action plan.

The results were composed by:

• Mapping of the resettlement area;
• Assessment of potential adverse and positive impacts on communities in quantitative and qualitative terms;
• Evaluation and analysis of potential loss of tangible and intangible assets;
• Definition of the compensation and eligibility criteria for beneficiaries;
• Presentation of technically and economically viable solutions and alternatives to ensure that the current standard of living of affected families is improved as a result of resettlement.

The work involved data collection through a deep understanding of the infrastructures, improvements, natural resources and those of households affected by the project in Ocua-Chiúre. The presentation of a compensation and resettlement plan for an estimated area of 1,000 ha in the Namravarava community, Ocua locality in the Chiúre district, in the province of Cabo Delgado.

Safe Land Access Project

Client – Millennium Challenge Account (MCA)
Location – Maputo, Zambézia, Nampula, Cabo Delgado and Niassa – Mozambique
Year – 2009 – 2013
Time – 5 years

The land component of the MCA facilitated improvements in land management systems and land rights records. It reviewed the policies and the corresponding legislation.

Verde Azul in partnership with HTSPE, Lda (UK) provided technical assistance for these activities.

Assistance began in 2009 and was completed in the second half of 2013. The project was particularly focused on the four provinces in the north of the country: Zambézia, Nampula, Niassa and Cabo Delgado.

The results included secure access to land with a focus on the need to produce tangible economic impacts that are shared by the poorest and the least favored social strata in the target provinces.

The current national land policy provides a basis for the whole approach through the following statement: “safeguard the rights of the Mozambican people to their land and natural resources, promoting investment and equitable and sustainable use of these resources”.

Current activities include the establishment of an improved registration system. It is intended to guarantee the various existing rights – concessionaires and formal. It is designed to simultaneously facilitate access to land for investors, who may eventually fall under these same rights.

The program also includes new solutions so that investors and communities can work together and share the results of their efforts, guided at all points by the principles of equality and sustainability.

About 6 separate institutions are involved in this program as beneficiaries and implementers of more than 40 million dollars of development aid: National Directorate of Land and Forests, CENACARTA, CFJJ, INFATEC and Municipalities.

The actions are focused on equal access to a formal registration system, accessible and available to the most needy.

Measures are also needed to strengthen the capacity of the most deprived to use individual and community resources independently or in partnership with the private sector and public partners.

Investor access to land can change the parameters of the local production system and, if well managed, it alters the local livelihood system, offering economic and employment opportunities that can enhance income and improve the social well-being of the most vulnerable communities.

The program presents a vision of transforming cities and districts, where investment brings resources and opportunities for local farmers, it was developed for farmers’ self-subsistence in order to develop alongside investors.

The administration record will be installed simultaneously with training to match the system of resources, capacity and competencies. The entire system is seen as a tool for rural development. It will clarify land rights, while managing the diverse rights and needs. The land component has a clear operational link with the decentralization process and its emphasis on the district as the country’s development hub.

Agro-Industrial Development of Banana and Mango, in the Province of Manica

Client – GIESTA
Location – Manica – Mozambique
Year – 2005 – 2007
Time – 2 years

Verde Azul was hired by a group of Mozambican investors to carry out pre-feasibility and feasibility studies, as well as plantation tests for the development of the banana and mango agro-industry for export.

The work involved land identification and legalization of approximately 230 hectares of land, including DUAT for agro-industrial production.

Verde Azul also implemented studies to evaluate the viability of bananas and other fruit production, mobilized a team and supervised the detailed analysis of the soil.

Verde Azul collaborated with the company Chiquita to collect data on precipitation, climate, social and environmental restrictions.

Verde Azul developed mitigation strategies, as well as negotiated with local authorities and communities.

Verde Azul carried out studies on water storage strategies in collaboration with a South African group, Crookes Brothers and initiated the legalization of land use rights for 1000 hectares of land areas for additional crops (DUAT acquisition), as part of its growth strategy.

CLUF Lands Community – Strengthening the Provincial Land Authorities (SPGCS) in the Provinces of Tete and Gaza

Client – CLUF
Location – Tete and Gaza – Mozambique
Year – 2013 – 2014
Time – 1 year

Evaluate the way of delimiting the community lands of execution made by ITC and associates. Under the support of the land administration community in the provinces of Gaza and Tete.

The objective of CLUF is to guarantee the rights and benefits to communities over the use of land and natural resources, with the objective of rural economic development.

The program follows an approach guided by the search for innovative solutions that guarantee the rights of communities to land, and proposes to play a facilitating role in the connection between communities and producer associations with potential investors, such as:

• Participation in the delimitation of community lands;
• Identify possible conflicts in the delimitation process;
• Propose improvements in the data collection and management system;
• Perform zoning based on information collected in the field and satellite image;
• Prepare a pre-proposed support for one and other SPGCs for a better discussion with DNTF ITC;
• Management committees.

Agro-Industrial Development for Commercial Banana Production in Sofala and Nampula Provinces

Client – CETA
Location – Sofala and Nampula – Mozambique
Year – 2007
Time – 6 months

Verde Azul assisted a group of investors to acquire the land use right document, from areas of cultivated land for the production of agro industrial bananas for export in the provinces of Sofala and Nampula.

Verde Azul implemented preliminary studies to assess the viability of banana production in terms of yield performance.

This involved the mobilization and coordination of soil studies, contacts with provincial and local authorities (SPGC and Economic Activities) and an environmental assessment of tracking and analyzing soil suitability and climatic conditions, as well as testing a number of varieties and of various planting technologies.