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Context and background: The role of Customary Land Secretariats (CLSs) in Ghana's land administration system cannot be misjudged. However, their ongoing practices have not received much attention from scholarships, land pundits, and policymakers. Goal and Objectives: Expressing concerns about the increasing collapse of CLSs, this study framed and conceptualised the nexus of CLSs with their functions and stakeholders in customary land administration (CLA) by examining (a) the composition of the land management committee (LMC), (b) land acquisitions, (c) alternative dispute resolution--ADR, and (d) interests in land from the perspective of CLA. Methodology: The paper employed descriptive and prescriptive analysis techniques with the help of existing data from the Berekum and the Duayaw Nkwanta CLSs in Ghana. Results: The analysed data shows the exclusion of women from the LMC. Again, we documented that the composition of the LMC is not well-defined, and significant improvement in land acquisitions and ADR recorded cases were also observed but no customary interest was documented. The study offers the need to clearly define and standardise the composition of the LMC as the primary policymakers in CLA. Reforms in the current customary practices and the Chieftaincy legal framework are also necessary to include women in the traditional for an inclusive local land governance [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Many studies have investigated the effects of large-scale land acquisition (LSLA) on livelihood, while the effects of LSLA by different actors on investment decisions and levels of investment have largely gone without academic scrutiny. Consequently, information concerning the implications of LSLA by actors on investment is scarce in the literature pertaining to policy. Drawing on information from 664 households selected through a multistage sampling technique, this study examined the relationship between direct and indirect exposure to LSLA by domestic and foreign entities and investment in land-improving techniques. The results show a bi-directional relationship between LSLA and household farm investments. While direct and indirect exposure to LSLA by domestic and foreign entities dissipates some forms of farm investments, the reverse causality is also possible where some household farm investments discourage direct and indirect exposure to LSLA by domestic and foreign entities. The results also revealed that LSLA by domestic and foreign entities dissipates investment in all levels of land- and yield-improving techniques, and even in the presence of a high perception of tenure security. Thus, the provision of legal ownership of land to farmers can provide insurance for investments in all land-improving techniques. Government can also step up the fertilizer subsidy program to enable households to increase investment to avoid further exposure to LSLA. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Land acquisition remains a critical issue that poses threats to the perceptions people have on land matters in Ghana. There have been diverse perceptions of land acquisition systems in Ghana. Despite the availability of lands in Ghana, the numerous challenges coupled with acquiring land present extreme nervousness to potential land buyers. This study sought to find out the perceptions people have in relation to the current challenges coupled with land acquisition in Ghana and the ways to curb these problems. Based on reviews of relevant land acquisition documents in Ghana, a questionnaire and semi-structured interview questions were used to gather data from 201 respondents. The findings revealed that the perceptions most people held about acquiring land in Ghana have to do with the cost involved and institutional bureaucratic issues (weak policy implementations, delays in processing land documents at the lands commission, and extortion of monies by some lands commission officers from clients, etc.) associated with acquiring land. It is suggested that public education, adoption of a digital land registry, fighting corruption, and effectively enacting land policies should be proactive government measures to curb the current challenges associated with land acquisition. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

With the rising urbanisation of some parts of Ghana, the demand for land for various purposes is inevitable. The article assesses current trend of large-scale land acquisition in Teshie and Kasoa. The study used semi-structured interviews to solicit primary data from key informants such as chiefs at Nyanyano-Kasoa and Tsie-We family head at Teshie, land guards, and investors who acquire large scale lands in these areas to identify the trends in such acquisitions between 2014 to 2019.The study uncovered that though there are variations in the nature of land ownership in Teshie and Kasoa, multiple sale of lands, poor land management practices, litigation and land guarding are common practices in both areas. The study found that there is an institutional gap as both the state and traditional institutions have not really done much to deal with the challenges confronting LSLAs in these areas. It is recommended that land owning groups be engaged and educated by the Lands Commission in collaboration with Customary Lands Secretariat on proper ways to manage and sell their lands to avoid multiple sales and the conflicts that it brings. The Ghana police service should crackdown on land guarding which is an illegal activity. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

It is an undeniable fact that large scale land acquisition for agricultural production and urban development in Ghana is on the upsurge. The receiving end of the effect of land acquisition on household livelihoods are those living on or proximal to the acquired lands. Using primary data collected from four districts in the northern region of Ghana, this study estimated household livelihood security (HLS) index for households living in communities with and without large scale land acquisition. HLS index for the two groups were estimated using household livelihood framework. Welch's t -test was used to test the hypothesis that communities without land acquisition have greater HLS index than their counterparts in communities with land acquisition. Also, conditional recursive mixed-process (CMP) was used to estimate the effects of large scale land acquisition on HLS index. The findings evinced that food security index, economic security index, sanitation security index, water security index, health security index, shelter security index and social security index for households living in communities without land acquisition is significantly higher than their counterparts in communities with land acquisition. The results also revealed that land acquisition has significant negative effects on the livelihood of households. It is therefore recommended that pragmatic steps should be taken to sensitize the release of land by allodial land title holders to buyers. Allodial title holders of land should pay appropriate and reasonable compensation to usufruct title holders of land to minimise the effects of land acquisition on household livelihoods. Also, compensation or alternative employment should be provided to the community members for loss of land-based activities and livelihoods. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Ghana experienced a surge in large-scale land acquisitions in the past decade spearheaded by the bioenergy crop jatropha. To accommodate such acquisitions, small and medium-sized land holdings were consolidated to develop large parcels of land that could accommodate large-scale investments. Chiefs have been an important player in these processes as they are supposed to be the custodians of land in Ghana. However, they often engage with such land acquisition processes in a counterproductive manner, deeply affecting their outcomes. Chiefs often act as the gatekeepers of large-scale land acquisitions, helping foreign donors/investors and the state steer the institutional landscape of land tenure, which is not only complicated but also prone to social conflicts. In order to unravel the exact roles that chiefs have played in such processes (and the motivations behind their actions) we adopt an agrarian political economy framework based on the five key questions: “ who owns what”, “who does what”, “who gets what” , “ who interacts with whom” and “participation by whom in what” . To answer these questions, we conduct interviews with chiefs, experts and local households around five collapsed jatropha plantations in Ghana. Our empirical analysis suggests that chiefs often went beyond their customary roles as land custodians, by occasionally acting as land owners/sellers, expropriators, negotiators, receivers of compensation, and sources of conflict. These roles are to an extent an outcome of the weak, undocumented and largely discretionary land administration system of Ghana, which allows chiefs benefit by bypassing both customary and statutory land laws. Chiefs were often motivated by expected economic gains for themselves at the expense of the communal interests. On some cases this unconstructive role catalysed the collapse of the jatropha investments. These suggest the need for deep land policy reforms within the land administration system of Ghana. While the recent adoption of guidelines for large-scale land acquisitions promoted by the government of Ghana is a good start, land policy reforms should go deeper. Further reforms would be needed to strengthen the current legislation in terms of harmonizing all land laws, as well as outlining explicit directives for land negotiations, compensation (including defining the rightful recipients of compensation) and the effective evaluation of large-scale land acquisitions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper examines the land market in Ghana using the Wa municipality as a study area, an urban land market that is largely underdeveloped. The study employed questionnaires to collect data on how the land market in the municipality functions. It was found that this land market basically comprises undeveloped land and most of the land units are located in areas without basic infrastructure or services. Furthermore, customary land is efficiently allocated to competing uses and users. However, the market is bedevilled with problems such as multiple land sales and boundary disputes as a result of the unavailability of documentation on land transactions in the municipality. It suggests that state policy interventions, and not the institutional bureaucracy of land management, are required to address the inherent market problems. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Abstract: Substantial differences in the size of landholdings among cocoa farmers in the Western Region – the last cocoa “frontier” in Ghana – are primarily a result of inheritance practices and the purchase of vast tracts of land by migrants in the initial period of the cocoa boom. Individual accumulation of land over the last decade has mainly taken place via inheritance (among indigenous farmers) without takeovers of land and dispossession of small-scale farmers outside the extended family. Land accumulation among migrant farmers is rare beyond the initial acquisition. Large-scale farmers transfer surplus from their higher volume of cocoa production into investments in non-farm activities and construction of new residential houses—and not in land acquisition based on market transactions. State regulation of the cocoa sector has spurred increased efficiency among private cocoa purchasing companies and thereby reduced the marginalization of farmers with small landholdings by preserving their access to a vital source of income. The unique character of the Ghanaian purchasing system is a major factor behind the relatively stable proportion in the access and control of land for cocoa between extended families. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]