Unequal Distribution of land and Biodiversity loss in Malawi (A case
of Thyolo and Mulanje Tea estates and the communities)
Mulanje
Mountain and Tea Plantations below it (picture by Mphatso Kalemba)
Introduction
Natural resources are the basic source of income,
food, shelter and medicine for most Malawians and yet these resources are
rapidly declining. The National Biodiversity and Strategic and Action Plan of
Malawi indicates that the rapid decline of natural resources is due to poverty,
a growing human population, increasing urbanization and high energy demands as
well as clearing of marginal land for cultivation(NBSAP 2006).
The Malawi Growth and Development Strategy of
2006-2011 is the country’s development strategy which recognizes conservation
of environment and natural resources as one of the priorities within priorities
(MGDS 2006-2010). However, despite being a priority within priorities, the
Malawi Millennium Development Goals Report of 2010 indicates that there are
significant challenges in protecting Malawi's precious resources, especially
forestry resources, which are the highest degraded.
Government efforts have mainly concentrated on
reducing poverty, which is said to be the main driver of deforestation by
promoting sustainable agricultural practices that maximize available land.
However, chronic land scarcity in Malawi and accompanying land degradation
presents the government with a dilemma: How to accommodate the land needs of
citizens while preserving the agro-export base of the economy (IRIN, 2006).
The colonial land ownership that happened in
Malawi in the early 19th century means that most of the fertile land
is occupied by large settler communities who own estates that produce the cash
crops on which Malawi’s struggling economy is dependent on. With a total land
area of 118,484km2 for the 13 million population, only 21% is arable land and
the tea, tobacco and sugar estates occupy most of the fertile land (IRIN,
2006). Land around the tea estates - situated mostly in the southern region of
the country - faces the heaviest pressure as the result of the historical
displacement of indigenous communities accompanying colonialism. (IRIN, 2006).
There is not much literature and policy that
quantifies land distribution patterns and their affects on poverty reduction
within Africa’s small-scale farming sector. Using household survey data from
five countries - Ethiopia, Kenya, Rwanda, Mozambique and Zambia - it was noted
that, in countries where 70-80% of the rural population derives the bulk of its
income from agriculture, poverty reduction typically depends on agricultural
productivity growth. In cases where land distribution is not equal and the
wealthy have access to more land; poverty reduction is not possible since the
initial distribution of assets affects the poverty-reducing effects of the
growth (Jayne et al., 2002).
Land is one of the natural
resources that remains unequally distributed in Malawi (Chirwa, 2008). Faced
with this limited access to land, Malawi’s population - nearly 85% percent of
who live in rural areas have no option but to unsustainably utilize forestry
products and clear more forests to open new farmlands for their survival.
Deforestation is more severe in forests on customary land in Malawi (ECA/SA/EGM Land, 2003).
Land problems in Malawi are
mainly on land tenure, access, land use and land governance all of which have
been reported to accelerate natural resources degradation (Gondwe 2002).
Despite this being the case most policies and strategies on biodiversity
conservation do not consider unequal land distribution as a driver to
biodiversity loss which affects other drivers like poverty and unsustainable
agriculture, as a result biodiversity loss continues to manifest at rampant
speed.
Background of Land Tenure in Malawi
The history of land tenure
issues in Malawi date back to the 9th century, when the Chewa ,
followed by the Sena, Lomwe , Ngoni and
Yao groups entered Malawi and displaced the original settlers , the Akafula and
Abatwa, who were driven out of Malawi to Namibia (Kandodo, 2001) . These new
settlers initiated wars over territories and slave trade as most land was
acquired by military conquest or occupation of abandoned land. The strongest
occupied the best land without any documented agreements but on the basis of
military power (Presidential commission of Inquiry on land, 1996).
Between 1891 and 1896 British
colonial forces intervened to bring a stop to these ethnic wars and establish
commercial enterprises and agricultural estates through grant of concessions
(F. Kandodo 2001). “The aim of colonial land policy in Malawi was to
appropriate all land to the British sovereign and to facilitate access by the
settler community on the basis of private title. The policy also redefined
native rights strictly as "occupation rights" in order to discourage
the establishment of land rights equivalent to freehold or the concessions
claimed by the settlers (Malawi Land Policy, 2002).
The result was loss of land
ownership and control by the indigenous communities as the whole land of Malawi
was now placed in the hands of the British sovereign. The power of traditional
authorities was now replaced by British laws and legislations (Millingtone and
Kaferawanthu 2005) and Land was categorized as public land, private land and
customary land. This was the position indigenous communities found themselves
in at independence in 1964 (F. Kandodo, 2001).
The thirty years that followed
under the dictatorship of President Kamuzu Banda( Ruled Malawi from 1964 t0
1994) saw the passing of Land Act in 1965 but it did not change the situation
as it continued classifying land as private land, public land and customary
land (Malawi Land Policy, 2002).
After the introduction of the
Land Act, the government embarked on a massive process of expanding large scale
agriculture and estates through customary land alienation (F. Kandodo, 2001).
This saw a lot of customary land being lost to private land. The increase in
estates meant an increase in the natural vegetation that was been removed to
give room to the cultivation of crops which were meant to grow tobacco, tea, sugarcane
and cotton and hardly benefited the local Malawian. Most of these estates were
controlled by the remaining British and the big political figures.
After establishment of democratic government
in 1994, a presidential inquiry on land reform which aimed at establishing new
land policy that would be economic, efficient, socially equitable and
environmental sustainable was instituted to redistribute land that was in the
hands of estates to farmers (since most of the land with estates was being
underused yet that with farmers was being overused and experience land and
resource degradation). Even though these findings were used to develop a new
land policy in 2002 which aims at ensuring tenure security and equitable access
to land, efforts to develop enabling administration and good governance
structures have not been fruitful. Land is still concentrated into the hands of
a few individuals e.g. Camforzi and Barrow Tea estates, together occupy almost
one third of Thyolo District total land area (F. Kandodo, 2001).
The case of Thyolo and Mulanje
Malawi was the first African
country to grow tea on commercial scale and this began in Mulanje district in
1880’s. This has so far grown and commercial tea estates in Malawi, owned
mostly by foreign countries account for 93% production with only 7% being done
by smallholder farmers (Sanne Van Der Wall, 2006). The biggest company is the
Eastern Produce Malawi which owns a total of 21 estates and it is a subsidiary
of Camilla, a British public limited company, and sells most of its produce to
major international companies like Unilever and Lyons Tetley. The tea is mainly
exported to United Kingdom and South Africa, who like the tea for its color and
brightness as a key factor in blending with leading tea brands (Sanne Van Der
Wall, 2006). In 2007, exports reached 42 thousand tons valued at 49 million USD
(ITC, 2007).
While the tea companies have
been enjoying such glory and success, the communities that surround these areas
have been struggling to make ends meet. The soci-economic conditions of
communities around these areas, both who work at the plantations, small holders
tea farmers and other farming communities is very pathetic. Work on the
plantation is very intensive and takes communities away from other activities
yet the daily wage is between US$ 0.70 and US$ 1.60 a day for plucking green
leaves. All the smallholder farmers sell their tea to the private estates at a
price fixed by the companies and hardly meet the current world prices. The
price for their green leaf, currently equivalent to US$ 0.082 per kilo, is does
not make any distinction for quality (Sanne Van Der Wall, 2006). The
communities around the areas live in poverty and can hardly meet the daily
basic needs.
Picture,
showing Malawians working in a tea plantation (Picture by Mphatso Kalemba)
Land is a limitation for farmers living around these tea
estates to meet their farm requirements and basic needs through subsistence and
commercial agriculture. A Malawi Baseline Livelihood survey conducted in 2005
indicates that Thyolo and Mulanje districts indicated that the average land
holding size in the district was < 1 acre (GOM, Ministry of Economic
Planning and Development, 2005).
The majority of fertile land is
taken up by the major tea companies and just little by small holder farmers.
People thus have reverted to clearing of marginal lands in order to cultivate
other crops, or to sell the cut trees as firewood or charcoal. There is rampant
biodiversity loss as the population is also increasing in these areas and has
to squeeze on the remaining available land that remains under the local chiefs.
Evidence of Biodiversity loss in
Thyolo and Mulanje
During 1999-2003, Thyolo forest
reserve was completely destroyed for subsistence agriculture reducing the
forest cover from >10 km2 (Dowsett-Lemaire and Dowsett 2006) to a single
fragment of 0.27 km2 on private land (CNS and JB unpubl. data). Thyolo Mountain
houses a rare bird species called Thyolo Alethe (Alethe Choloensis).
However,
extensive deforestation also has occurred on this mountain as well as Mulanje
mountain which represents the largest area of montane forest (Baylisset al.
2007) and has resulted in three of the region’s evergreen forest bird species
being accorded IUCN threat status Endangered (Thyolo Alethe, Spotted
Ground-Thrush Zootheraguttata and Yellow-throated Apalis Apalis
flavigularis) andone Vulnerable (White-winged Apalis Apalis chriessa)
(Birdlife International 2004).
Apart from the threatened bird species, Mulanje
mountain which offers spectacular views across tea plantations to Mozambique,
sheer drops down gullies laced with waterfalls; glades shaded by forest trees
where purple crested loeries and sun squirrels scuttle along the branches;
montane grasslands dotted with ground orchids and gladioli and alive with
butterflies; houses forests of fragrant Mulanje cedar trees which are endemic
to Malawi and are endangered.
The endangered Mulanje cedar Widdringtonia
whytei, endemic to the Mount Mulanje massif in Malawi, has been on
the decrease due to increased fire incidence and illegal logging. Valued for
its fine timber, attractive fragrance, and pesticide-resistant sap, the tree
has been regarded as highly desirable since its discovery in the late 19th
century (Julian Bayliss et. al. 2007).
A study conducted in 2007, on “saving the Islands in the sky…the plight of the
Mulanje Cedar” identified an area of 845.3 ha of Mulanje cedar, which
represents a loss of 616.7 ha over the previous 15 years. Of the recorded trees
32.27% (37,242 m3) were dead cedars, indicating that the rest were
lost to illegal logging (Julian Bayliss et. al, 2007).
In all the two instances, the obvious causes of
biodiversity loss were poverty and clearing of land for agriculture. However,
Poverty is initiated by lack of fertile land for farming to meet daily food
requirements and generate income. This lack of fertile lands by the
communities’ results from the unequal distribution of land, where a lot of land
and most of the fertile land in the two districts belongs the tea estates. This
link shows how unequal distribution of land has led to biodiversity loss in the
two districts and continues to be a major threat.
Recommendations
Due to the link between access to resources, such
as land and poverty in an agrarian economy (Chirwa, 2008), the Malawi
Government introduced a programme of land reforms (GOM, 2002). Two ways were
highlighted as measures to address the problem of small land holdings among
smallholder farmers in Malawi
1. Ensuring
security of tenure through tilting of customary land as customary estate.
It has been observed that security of tenure
helps in developing the land market, which has implications on poverty
reduction – such as facilitating access to financial or physical capital and
rent or sales (World Bank, 2003).
2.
Distributing land to the landless
The Malawi Government has introduced a willing seller/willing buyer
approach to land redistribution and a resettlement programme to the landless or
near landless (GOM, 2002, World Bank, 2004).
In 2004,
the Government launched a pilot project, the Community-Based Rural Land
Development Project (CBRLDP) in four districts among them Thyolo and Mulanje,
where the average land holdings among smallholder farmers are smallest with the
highest population density. The main objective of the CBRLDP is to increase the
incomes of about 15,000 poor rural families by providing land to the landless
(Chirwa, 2008).
Despite all these measures in place, the greatest
challenge lies in the effective implementation of such policies and projects.
To implement land reforms there is need for the country to have adequate
resources to fund the activities. There is need to effectively coordinate with
NGO’s and other development partners to assist the government in the implementation.
Previous work has been dominated by government officials who are limited in
human and financial resources and are mostly corrupt. We believe involvement of
other stakeholders will not only speed up the process, but also ease the financial
burden on the government.
One other limitation
to implementation is low participation
due to ignorance by the communities. There is need for civic education to
empower communities to own the reformation programmes and participate
effectively. Involvement of other stakeholders will definitely speed up the
awareness of the policy.
The land reform provides a great opportunity for
the poor and landless to access larger land parcels under the resettlement
programme. This will have a positive impact on welfare and will lead to poverty
reduction among the beneficiary households (Chirwa 2008) which will in turn
reduce over-dependence on forestry resources and reduce biodiversity loss and
degradation.
Perhaps Malawi can learn a great deal from
countries like Taiwan and Vietnam who have had major land reforms before. In
Taiwan, land reforms included the new tenure system that limited land rents,
privatization of government farms and restrictions on absentee landlords (Chen,
1994) whilst in Vietnam there was transfer of rights from farming co-operatives
to individual households (Do, 2008).
As long as inequality in land access and
distribution continues in Malawi, especially in Thyolo and Mulanje Districts,
Poverty will continue to be on the rise and will continue to put pressure on
natural resources, leading to biodiversity loss in the process.
