Indigenous peoples worldwide experience substantially poorer mental health than non-Indigenous populations, yet the causal mechanisms behind this disparity remain poorly understood. This paper provides the first causal evidence that large-scale land-use change—specifically, deforestation driven by oil palm expansion—adversely affects the mental health of Indigenous peoples through spiritual–cultural displacement. Focusing on the Dayak of Borneo, whose cultural identity and spiritual practices are deeply tied to primary rainforest, we combine quasi-experimental variation in village-level exposure to deforestation with a lab-in-the-field experiment involving 2,700 individuals in rural Indonesia. We find that greater exposure to forest loss significantly increases anxiety and depression among Dayak respondents, but not among non-Indigenous groups. Complementary priming experiments show that reminders of rapid environmental change temporarily heighten distress, particularly for Dayaks in highly exposed villages. Our findings highlight the overlooked psychological costs of tropical deforestation and the centrality of land in Indigenous well-being.

Bolivia has undertaken one of the world’s most extensive land titling and regularization efforts, significantly reshaping the institutional foundations of rural land governance. Despite the scale and policy significance of these reforms, their effects have not been systematically evaluated. In addition to its sheer scale, a key feature of Bolivia’s titling program is its dual approach: the simultaneous implementation of private titling for individual citizens and agribusiness firms, and collective titling for Indigenous and campesino communities. These two modalities correspond to fundamentally different land-governance structures and, as a result, may influence economic behavior through distinct mechanisms. We investigate the impact of Bolivia’s large-scale land governance reform on several dimensions of local economic development, distinguishing between the effects of collective and private titling efforts, and assessing the heterogeneous impacts these programs may have across different types of households and individuals.

This paper evaluates a centrally-planned resettlement policy in rural Laos intended to modernize livelihoods and reduce poverty among ethnic groups traditionally practicing swidden agriculture. By relocating villages from mountain slopes to valleys, the policy aimed to transition societies toward wet-rice cultivation, considered more technologically advanced and environmentally sustainable. Using staggered treatment timing, I find the policy reduced village swidden plots by 30–40% five to ten years post-resettlement. However, ethnographic studies reveal how swidden practices are deeply interwoven with kinship ties and ethnic identities. Using a triple-difference strategy comparing swidden and wet-rice societies across regions with varying treatment intensity, I find evidence of decreased well-being among those impacted: lower schooling attainment, increased child mortality, lower child health outcomes, and reduced household wealth. Exploring mechanisms, I find the policy had negligible impact on the share of farmers practicing swidden agriculture, suggesting it only reduced plots without generating structural change, thus lowering per-capita inputs.

Agroforestry improves agricultural productivity and climate adaptation while also potentially boosting farmer incomes and resilience. However, obtaining widespread adoption among vulnerable populations has been a persisting challenge. Strengthening farmers’ tenure security is commonly hypothesized to lower barriers, particularly in customary land systems, but evidence of its effectiveness is limited. This nexus has considerable import in Zambia where climate variability exacerbates yield-gaps and food insecurity, and land reforms seek to harmonize customary and state systems and strengthen tenure security for sustainable development. We draw on panel household survey and qualitative data to report longer-term results from a cluster-randomized control trial of a USAID initiative that piloted customary land certification and agroforestry support in Zambia. We report positive tenure security, land governance and agroforestry impacts, with some caveats, seven years on. Results also explore landholder context associated with uptake and tree survival, refine impact pathways and timeframes, and highlight ongoing challenges.

This paper examines how water resources mediate the relationship between climate shocks and violence. Combining high-resolution data on temperature, hydrology, and conflict events across Africa from 1997 to 2023, we show that high-temperature shocks increase conflict in nearby water-rich areas. The results are driven by shocks originating in downstream locations, consistent with groups seeking to secure access to upstream water sources that confer greater control over river flow. The effect is stronger for persistent temperature shocks and in regions experiencing long-run decline in water availability. These findings highlight a mechanism through which climate change may increase conflict risk, as rising temperatures and shifts in the distribution of surface water intensify competition over water resources.

Climate change is increasingly driving land‑based conflicts in drought‑prone regions where environmental stress intersects with fragile governance systems. This study examines land governance solutions in Ethiopia’s Somali Region, particularly Harshin district, where climate stress, mobility, and contested authority converge. Findings show that addressing climate‑induced conflicts requires more than environmental interventions, it also requires a transformation in we govern land. The study highlights key land governance solutions such as securing tenure rights for pastoralists and agro‑pastoralists, legally recognizing migration corridors and dry‑season reserves, and embedding climate risk into land‑use planning. More importantly, hybrid governance mechanisms that combine customary dispute resolution with statutory enforcement are found to be essential for legitimacy and effectiveness. Ultimately, effective land governance solutions for climate induced conflicts require secure tenure systems, stronger local institutions, and the integration of climate adaptation into resource management.

Violence and population displacement during conflicts can severely disrupt agricultural systems, particularly in countries with limited arable land. These disruptions not only threaten food security and rural livelihoods but also deepen the broader socioeconomic consequences of war. Despite the significance of this issue, empirical evidence on the causal impact of conflict on agricultural land use remains scarce, primarily due to data limitations and endogeneity concerns between agricultural land use and conflict. We examine how the Syrian civil war (2011–2024) affected land use using a spatial regression discontinuity design along the Syria–Türkiye border. We show that the conflict resulted in a loss of cropland mass and cultivation intensity in Syria relative to Türkiye. We provide evidence that cropland loss likely resulted from destruction of irrigation infrastructure and institutions that made Syria more vulnerable to droughts, as well as from cultivation disruption in the context of territorial fight between armed groups.

Women’s housing, land, and property (HLP) rights in Sub-Saharan Africa remain profoundly unequal despite significant regional policy commitments. This paper argues that these rights constitute a missing but essential pillar of the Women, Peace, and Security (WPS) agenda. Drawing on regional evidence and case studies from fragile and climate-affected contexts, the paper demonstrates how unequal land governance perpetuates gendered vulnerability during conflict, displacement, and recovery, while secure HLP rights generate measurable peace and resilience dividends. Using a feminist political economy lens, it analyzes the institutional gaps between continental land frameworks and WPS implementation, highlighting how current policy silos weaken both agendas. The paper proposes strategic pathways for integrating women’s HLP rights into World Bank diagnostics, land reforms, climate programs, and FCV operations. It concludes that strengthening women’s tenure security is foundational to achieving structural peace, inclusive growth, and the next generation of gender-responsive development policy.

Research has shown that ownership of assets, such as land, is strongly correlated with well-being and economic security. To understand this relationship robust measures of ownership are needed. However, standard survey modules on asset ownership often rely on a single respondent and capture only reported or documented ownership. To address this limitation and to better understand ownership and the effects on women’s empowerment, the Measures for Advancing Gender Equality (MAGNET) Initiative developed five survey tools - vignettes and a scale - to address key questions such as: What does ownership entail? Do people share a common understanding of ownership? What are people’s preferences regarding individual versus joint ownership? Each tool was tested in the field in at least two countries per tool covering land and other key assets. This paper validates the tools using a three-phase framework and motivates their inclusion in household surveys.

We investigate the sensitivity of rural land rental market participation statistics, which are based on survey data collected (a) from different household respondents, and (b) under alternative questionnaire design characteristics. Our analysis is based on data from male and female spousal pairs from farming households in rural Zambia. We provide evidence of systematic underreporting of rented-in and rented-out land, which stem from different underlying causes. Underreporting of rented-in land appears to be associated with salience bias in plot roster responses and can be partially addressed through nudges embedded in questionnaires. Underreporting of rented-out land, on the other hand, appears to be associated with self-censoring, possibly reflective of social desirability biases, and stronger for men than women. Interestingly, while male and female respondents indicate similar average rates of rental market participation, we observe household-level discordance in reported rates of tenancy, suggesting gendered biases in responses partly related to intra-household information asymmetry.

Accurate land measurement is critical for agricultural research, yet GPS-based plot data in household surveys are prone to error. Using two rounds of Nigeria’s General Household Survey–Panel Wave 5 (2023–2024), we apply machine learning algorithms to detect and correct anomalies in plot size data, and validate improvements with repeated GPS measurements. We find that 21% of plots were flagged as anomalous in the post-planting round, but re-measurement in the post-harvest round reduced anomalies by over 60%. Environmental factors and surveyor characteristics were significantly associated with changes in anomaly status. Productivity estimates are highly sensitive to plot size definitions: doubling plot size is associated with a 49–58% decrease in output value per unit area, confirming the inverse farm size–productivity relationship. Our findings demonstrate the value of machine learning for survey data quality assurance and highlight the policy importance of reliable land measurement for credible productivity analysis in agricultural and development research.

Mixed-mode data collection strategies, combining phone and in-person interviews, are increasingly used in longitudinal surveys in low- and middle-income countries to reduce costs while maintaining data quality. This paper uses experimental data from Nigeria to assess whether mixed-mode surveys can reduce recall bias in reporting agricultural labor and input use. The findings reveal substantial recall bias in the standard method: plots in the mixed-mode group were 92.6% more likely to report individual labor participation, and the number of household members reported as working increased by 101.5%. Conversely, hours and days worked per person were overreported in the recall survey, with reductions of 29–32% observed under the mixed-mode approach. Non-labor inputs such as fertilizers, herbicides, and pesticides were underreported by up to 198% in the recall survey. These results underscore the potential of mixed-mode surveys to dramatically improve the accuracy of agricultural input data and inform more effective policy design.

This paper is intended to define the fundamental concepts of the mass appraisal system, based on the ad valorem principle, as well as to analyze the main aspects of its development and the expected outcomes of its implementation. In essence, the work aligns with the modern directions of development adopted by emerging national economies, oriented toward the transition to and implementation of mass appraisal systems for real estate in fiscal purposes. Conventionally, the direct beneficiaries of the concepts and proposals formulated in this paper are countries with emerging economies, currently in the process of establishing, reforming, or developing their own national mass appraisal systems. At the same time, the theoretical and methodological aspects developed herein may serve as a valuable reference for developed economies, by promoting new concepts in the field of mass real estate valuation, adapted to the contemporary economic and institutional context.

This paper examines the use of geographically weighted regression (GWR) for mass appraisal of agricultural land in support of property taxation in Moldova. While prior research has widely applied hedonic and spatial models to residential and commercial properties, there is very limited evidence on agricultural markets and virtually none that evaluates tax equity using industry standards. Using over 15,000 arm’s-length agricultural sales, we estimate a GWR model for the entire country and assess its performance with ratio-study metrics (median ratio, COD, PRD) consistent with international guidance. Results indicate that GWR yields generally acceptable accuracy and uniformity across most regions, but performance deteriorates in and around Chisinauv, suggesting distinct market dynamics and likely omitted variable bias in higher-value, peri-urban areas. We outline ongoing work to improve the model for the capital region, construct confidence intervals for ratio statistics, and reduce vertical inequity as evidenced by the PRD.

This paper reports results from the 2024 China Real Estate Internal Rate of Return (IRR) Survey, commissioned by the China Institute of Real Estate Appraisers and Agents (CIREAA). Using verified transaction data across twenty-five major cities and three property sectors, the survey provides a comparative benchmark of investment performance in China’s property markets. Findings show pronounced regional disparities: first-tier cities maintain moderate IRRs under restrictive policies, emerging inland and southern cities record higher returns linked to industrial diversification and population inflows, while older industrial regions continue to show weak or negative performance. Case studies of Beijing, Shanghai, Xi’an, Nanning, Lanzhou, and Shenzhen highlight the local economic and regulatory factors driving these outcomes. The study concludes that China’s real estate market operates as differentiated submarkets rather than a uniform national system, and underscores the importance of ongoing IRR monitoring for investment planning, valuation transparency, and policy formulation.

Blantyre City Council (BCC) in Malawi is implementing digital billing and payment systems to enhance its revenue collection methods, improve operational efficiency, and increase transparency for its residents. The new systems allow citizens to pay city rates and fees through mobile platforms or over-the-counter services, significantly minimizing the necessity for physical visits to municipal offices. Currently in the pilot phase, this initiative aims to streamline various services including payment of city rates, issuance of bills, handling inquiries, reporting issues such as refuse collection, formalizing property records, and submitting suggestions all achievable from the convenience of residents’ homes via their mobile phones. The overarching goal of BCC's digital transformation is to boost revenue collection, thereby facilitating better service delivery to the community.

Land recordal systems (often referred to as deeds registration or recording systems) and land registration systems are two primary frameworks for documenting property ownership and rights in land. Both aim to provide evidence of title, facilitate transactions, and prevent fraud or disputes, but they differ fundamentally in their approach, legal protections, and operational mechanics: recordal systems focus on archiving documents, while registration systems certify ownership itself. The core contrast lies in what is recorded and the level of state guarantee provided. These differences stem from historical evolution, with recordal systems emerging from English common law’s emphasis on private deeds, while registration systems, pioneered by Robert Torrens in 1858 in South Australia, prioritize state-verified certainty. This research will adopt a comparative methodology, drawing on reliable secondary sources.

The Constitution of Kenya provides that “Parliament shall revise, consolidate and rationalize all existing land laws”. It is on the basis of this that Land Registration Act (LRA) was enacted to provide harmony, especially in the sector of land registration.The Kenya National Land Policy (Sessional Paper No. 3 of 2009) had also proposed such measures. The LRA provides that all land in Kenya will be registered and titled under one registration system. This provision, as opposed to other provisions for conversion, is mandatory. It also provides that land registration can be automated an aspect not provided for in the repealed laws. This paper examines how effective and efficient LRA is in bringing about modernization in conveyancing in Kenya.

Uganda’s transition to a Digital Land Economy is one of its most ambitious land administration reforms, marked by the implementation of the Land Information System (LIS) and the Land Valuation Information Management System (LAVMIS). Despite these advancements and their integration with national identification, revenue, financial, and judicial systems, 70% of land remains unregistered, hindering tenure security, increasing transaction costs, and limiting economic benefits. This study examines how digital land systems affect socio-economic outcomes, including business costs, land investments, collateral accessibility, real estate development, employment, government revenues, and financial inclusion. Using institutional economics, transaction cost theory, and digital transformation frameworks, the research identifies mixed results, such as reduced processing times but increased transaction costs and persistent legal and institutional barriers. The study provides evidence-based recommendations to enhance institutional coordination, promote inclusive access, and align digital reforms with broader economic strategies, offering actionable insights for sustainable and inclusive socio-economic growth

The global real estate sector is undergoing a fundamental shift as Web3 technology introduces unprecedented efficiency and openness to immovable property market. This paper presents a model end-to-end business process for tokenization of immovable property in Georgia, connecting state-oriented legal certainty and decentralized financial innovation. By integrating the National Agency of Public Registry (NAPR) with a dedicated Web3 platform, the proposed framework establishes an efficient tokenization mechanism for physical assets. Study outlines a practical operational model that transforms the property market into a high-liquidity, globally accessible ecosystem. While tailored to Georgia, the framework is designed for international export, providing model legislative solutions, positioning Georgia as one of pioneers in the Web3-driven tokenized economy.

This paper examines how labor migration shapes land rental market dynamics in rural Nepal using nationally representative NLSS-IV data on 5,780 agricultural landowners. Despite substantial remittance inflows, most households remain inactive in land markets. Migration increases lease-in participation, particularly among smallholders, but has no effect on lease-out behavior, producing a “partial land market freeze.” Migrant households exhibit stronger agricultural engagement through higher cropping intensity, livestock turnover, and land acquisition borrowing, indicating unmet demand for land. Meanwhile, significant land remains idle alongside land-constrained tenant farmers. The findings highlight institutional supply-side barriers rather than financial constraints as the key impediment to efficient land reallocation.

This paper builds upon findings from in-depth study of the land laws of Africa’s 55 states. The subject analysed is the legal status of communal lands in the vast community lands sector. While property rights reforms since 1990 have greatly improved individual and family security over houses and farms, their traditionally owned commons have been yet further de-secured. This paper explores the connections between this vulnerability, often the only significant asset of communities, the reluctance of many governments to release these to their rightful owners, the disturbing extent of armed violence and war in so many states. Unjust property norms made worse by forced flight is reaching dangerous levels for fair governance, peace, and justice. More genuinely inclusive economic growth paths are essential to bring the continent back from the brink.

The 'Additions to Reserve process' (ATR) transfers Crown or Fee Simple property to the reserve land status communities in Canada. The past and current processes have resulted in a fifty percent increase in First Nations reserve land title transfers since 1972. These significant new land title transfers rely on modern geomatics land data, which mainly uses land parcel mapping, cadastral land surveying, and geographic information systems (GIS) as the legal parcel evidence for an ATR submission. The historical ATR program transfer metrics and study findings show that ATR geomatics data is key to providing Canada's land transfer approval and enabling new economic transactions for First Nation reserves regarding an undervalued economic policy. Today, the current ATR policy redesign presents opportunities and issues to resolve, with a potential Two-Eyed Seeing (TES) data protocol for a future UNDRIP-based reserve land economic development program in Canada, in new geomatics land challenges and issues.

How are Indigenous communal property rights (ICPR) enforced? In countries with flexible property rights regimes, land tenure is subject to economic rents and the political benefits it provides to the state, producing selective enforcement against groups whose land use is deemed suboptimal and whose population is too small to generate electoral returns. When this enforcement gap is large, states will not enforce ICPR. This is the case for the Garifuna people of Honduras, where the state's non-enforcement of ICPR has led government actors to overlook and at times encourage territorial encroachment. To overcome these domestic enforcement failures, the Garifuna use the OFRANEH to monitor shortcomings, then leverage the OAS Inter-American Court of Human Rights to internationalize enforcement. I present an analysis of three Garifuna communities and their cases before the Court to highlight how indigenous communities use international institutions to secure rights their own states purposefully fail to enforce.

Strengthening land rights can improve a range of development outcomes, leading many African governments to formalize customary land rights. However, women are often excluded from newly formalized rights that privilege primary rights holders. We document the impacts of Burkina Faso’s Rural Land Governance (RLG) project on women’s rights to land, using the 50 treatment and matched control communes in the pilot phase of the program. Using surveys conducted at endline, we find that the RLG program statistically significantly reduced women’s perceived rights to land in treated communes. Both men and women are less likely to report women can access land, make land-related decisions, inherit land, or be added to land documents. This social renegotiation of women’s rights also spills over into other domains of women’s empowerment. In formalizing rights, the program crystallized men’s primary claims and opened contestation over women’s rights, demonstrating the unintended gendered consequences of land formalization.

Farms throughout Asia are predominantly small. In fact, the average operational farm size was already small in the 1970s, ranging from 1 hectare to 4 hectares. The average farm size declined in subsequent periods in almost all countries in Asia. Many studies found an inverse relationship between farm size and productivity in South Asia, indicating that small farms are more efficient than large farms. Since small farms are endowed with a large amount of family labor relative to land, in contrast to large farms which rely on hired labor, the inverse relationship between farm size and productivity tends to arise. Recently, mechanization has been taking place to replace hired labor with machines. According to recent studies, the inverse relationship has been either weakened or reversed to be positive. To maintain a comparative advantage in agriculture in Asia, farm size must be expanded and mechanization must be promoted to save labor.

Farm size is small in China. Ensuring the land tenure rights, structural transformation, and slowdown rural population growth have facilitated farm size expansion, while agricultural mechanization custom service is a double-edged sword as it has helped smallholders’ mechanization and therefore also affected them to abandon crop production. Relationship between farm size and land productivity (yield) has been debated. Given the limited land and water, appropriate farm size is important for national food security, productivity and employment. We expect that farm size for land-intensive crops such as grain and edible oil crops will continue to rise, while farm size for labor-intensive crops such as vegetables and facility crops will keep small but also rise over time. Facilitating structural transformation and division of the land-intensive grain production and the labor- & capital-intensive crop production are key factors that will drive farm size expansion.

This study examines the relationship between farm size and productivity in China’s grain sector, and explores how institutional reforms mediate this link. The Household Responsibility System (1978–84) spurred growth but entrenched small-scale, fragmented farms (<0.65 ha), limiting mechanization. Using nationwide data (2003–2020), we find an inverse U-shaped relationship: productivity peaks on very small farms (<0.5 ha) but declines with scale. Two key reforms help bridge this gap: land rental markets, which consolidate plots into moderate-scale operations (5–15 ha) and raise yields by 10–20%, and outsourced mechanization services, which boost profits by 12–18% and yields by 15–25%. However, small farms (<1 ha) still face 20–30% lower mechanization rates, risking inequality. China’s “service-led scaling” model underscores that institutional adaptability — not just larger farms — is key to sustaining productivity in land-scarce economies.

Inverse relationship between farm size and productivity has been the most widely debated aspects of Indian agriculture. This paper examines the changes in farm size and productivity over the recent decades across the regions and identify the contributing factors. Other objectives include: i) assess the viability of small holder farms, ii) examine the relative shares of factors of production, and iii) explore the potential policy options for strengthening and sustaining smallholder farms in India. The paper also focuses on the role of economic reforms in the rural sector. These include: increased share of non-farm incomes, shifting of large-holders to urban centres for various socioeconomic reasons, improved socioeconomic conditions of the vulnerable rural communities. All these changes despite the fact that agriculture was only at the periphery of the reforms. It is argued that given the numbers coupled with the nature of growth, the current policies are neither effective nor sustainable.

The research presented in this paper is based on a joint activity of the German Aerospace Center (DLR) and the World Bank, with the objective to provide a novel 4D building dataset for the Global South that helps to better understand how building area and height have developed since 1985. To produce this dataset – the World Settlement Footprint 4D (WSF® 4D) –, information from various state-of-the-art global geo-data collections on building footprints, building height, and spatial expansion of the built-up area are combined. The WSF® 4D offers scientists, planners, and decision makers novel insights into the settlement growth over four decades in a so far unprecedented spatiotemporal detail and coverage. This work therefore contributes to a deeper understanding of the complex patterns of global urbanization and its drivers and impacts.

Locally determined patterns of urbanization and spatial development are key factors to the exposure and vulnerability of people to climatic shocks. Using high-resolution annual data, this study shows that, since 1985, human settlements around the world—from villages to megacities—have expanded continuously and rapidly into present-day flood zones. In many regions, growth in the most hazardous flood zones is outpacing growth in non-exposed zones by a large margin, particularly in East Asia, where high-hazard settlements have expanded 60% faster than flood-safe settlements. These results provide systematic evidence of a divergence in the exposure of countries to flood hazards. Instead of adapting their exposure, many countries continue to actively amplify their exposure to increasingly frequent climatic shocks.

The 21st-century global urbanization wave manifests as metropolization, where urban centers, sub-centers, and peripheral functional zones collectively form highly aggregated forms of regional growth poles—metropolitan areas that aggregate resources and drive development. However, metropolitan areas delineation has persistently lacked a data-driven framework reconciling regional heterogeneity and global applicability. Leveraging multi‑source, multi‑modal datasets, this study first constructs a worldwide “natural‑humanistic base‑zone” map with spatially‑constrained clustering. Within each base‑zone, principal‑component analysis generates a Centrality Index and a Radiation Index to capture central area and radiant area in metropolitan, and change point model identifies the metropolitan area realistic boundary and hierarchical urban-rural gradient structure. Explainable machine learning model Light-GBM with SHAP is applied into revealing the relationship between metropolitan areas’ features and blue-green morphology. This study will offer innovative insights to enhance understanding global metropolitan areas from the “Anthropo-geosphere” viewpoint, holding scientific significance for achieving UN Sustainable Development Goals and fostering human-nature harmony.

The Brazilian Rural Environmental Registry (CAR) is vital for monitoring compliance, but its declaratory nature allows for polygon rectifications that may conceal environmental liabilities. This study develops a spatio-temporal framework to analyze 27,014 properties in the Legal Amazon that underwent boundary modifications. By integrating CAR data with PRODES/INPE deforestation records, embargo databases, and SIGEF land registries, the research identifies patterns of liability evasion. Results reveal significant spatial transformations, including a 50% median area reduction and an 11 km average centroid displacement. A strong correlation exists between rectifications and environmental infractions. Furthermore, findings indicate systematic reclassification of property sizes to influence regulatory thresholds and credit access. Integration with SIGEF distinguishes legitimate corrections from strategic manipulations. These findings highlight critical challenges for CAR’s integrity, emphasizing the need for robust cross-database validation to strengthen environmental governance, financial regulation, and supply chain monitoring in emerging economies.

This research addresses the lack of a standardized, scalable methodology for defining and assessing Land Tenure-Related Risks. Understanding this type of risk can be beneficial for more sustainable and transparent global commodity supply chains, often being linked to Human Rights violations and potential conflict, which can affect corporate reputation and production continuity. The proposed methodology employs a multi-phase approach using a systematic literature review and sophisticated GIS analysis. It presents Land Tenure-Related Risk as an integrated function of three core components: Geospatial certainty, Tenure Recognition/Legal Status, and Compliance with Land-Use Regulations. This conceptual model is applied to Brazil due to its complexity and importance as a commodity exporter. The case study integrates at least 14 distinct, publicly available official datasets within a PostgreSQL spatial database. The results are expected to serve as a vital due diligence tool for companies, an enforcement guide for public administration, and a monitoring instrument for civil society.

This paper explores the historical origins and evolution of land grabbing in Kenya, tracing its roots to the colonial era when policies promoting European settlement disrupted indigenous land tenure systems. These dynamics persisted after independence, enabling widespread illegal and irregular allocations of public land. The executive, particularly the President, became the central custodian of public land, inheriting broad discretionary powers that often-facilitated land grabbing. The National Land Policy and the Constitution of Kenya recognize land grabbing as a historical injustice requiring urgent redress. Using a systematic literature review and case studies, this study highlights the enduring governance gaps that sustain the problem. Situating Kenya’s experience within global trends of large-scale land acquisitions by powerful foreign state and private actors, the paper raises concerns about sovereignty, community rights, and sustainable land governance.