Land, Women, Youths, and Land Tools or Methods Printed Edition of the Special Issue Published in Land www.mdpi.com/journal/land Uchendu Eugene Chigbu Edited by Land, Women, Youths, and Land Tools or Methods Land, Women, Youths, and Land Tools or Methods Editor Uchendu Eugene Chigbu MDPI • Basel • Beijing • Wuhan • Barcelona • Belgrade • Manchester • Tokyo • Cluj • Tianjin Editor Uchendu Eugene Chigbu Department of Land and Property Sciences, Namibia University of Science and Technology Namibia Editorial Office MDPI St. Alban-Anlage 66 4052 Basel, Switzerland This is a reprint of articles from the Special Issue published online in the open access journal Land (ISSN 2073-445X) (available at: https://www.mdpi.com/journal/land/special issues/land women). For citation purposes, cite each article independently as indicated on the article page online and as indicated below: LastName, A.A.; LastName, B.B.; LastName, C.C. Article Title. Journal Name Year , Volume Number , Page Range. ISBN 978-3-03943-953-9 (Hbk) ISBN 978-3-03943-954-6 (PDF) Cover image courtesy of Nichola Knox. © 2020 by the authors. Articles in this book are Open Access and distributed under the Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY) license, which allows users to download, copy and build upon published articles, as long as the author and publisher are properly credited, which ensures maximum dissemination and a wider impact of our publications. The book as a whole is distributed by MDPI under the terms and conditions of the Creative Commons license CC BY-NC-ND. Contents About the Editor . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . vii Preface to “Land, Women, Youths, and Land Tools or Methods” . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . ix Uchendu Eugene Chigbu Land, Women, Youths, and Land Tools or Methods: Emerging Lessons for Governance and Policy Reprinted from: Land 2020 , 9 , 507, doi:10.3390/land9120507 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1 Abebaw Andarge Gedefaw, Clement Atzberger, Walter Seher and Reinfried Mansberger Farmers Willingness to Participate In Voluntary Land Consolidation in Gozamin District, Ethiopia Reprinted from: Land 2019 , 8 , 148, doi:10.3390/land8100148 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7 Joseph Kwaku Kidido and Monica Lengoiboni Household Land Allocations and the Youth Land Access Nexus: Evidence from the Techiman Area of Ghana Reprinted from: Land 2019 , 8 , 185, doi:10.3390/land8120185 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 29 Evelin J ̈ urgenson and Marii Rasva The Changing Structure and Concentration of Agricultural Land Holdings in Estonia and Possible Threat for Rural Areas Reprinted from: Land 2020 , 9 , 41, doi:10.3390/land9020041 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 49 Paula Gabriela N ́ u ̃ nez, Carolina Lara Michel, Paula Alejandra Leal Tejeda and Mart ́ ın Andr ́ es N ́ u ̃ nez Rural Women’s Invisible Work in Census and State Rural Development Plans: The Argentinean Patagonian Case Reprinted from: Land 2020 , 9 , 92, doi:10.3390/land9030092 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 65 Pamela Dur ́ an-D ́ ıaz, Adriana Armenta-Ram ́ ırez, Anne Kristiina Kurjenoja and Melissa Schumacher Community Development through the Empowerment of Indigenous Women in Cuetzalan Del Progreso, Mexico Reprinted from: Land 2020 , 9 , 163, doi:10.3390/land9050163 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 91 Barikisa Owusu Ansah and Uchendu Eugene Chigbu The Nexus between Peri-Urban Transformation and Customary Land Rights Disputes: Effects on Peri-Urban Development in Trede, Ghana Reprinted from: Land 2020 , 9 , 187, doi:10.3390/land9060187 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 117 Elizabeth Louis, Tizai Mauto, My-Lan Dodd, Tasha Heidenrich, Peter Dolo and Emmanuel Urey Using a Gender-Responsive Land Rights Framework to Assess Youth Land Rights in Rural Liberia Reprinted from: Land 2020 , 9 , 247, doi:10.3390/land9080247 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 145 Nhung Pham Thi, Martin Kappas and Daniel Wyss Benefits and Constraints of the Agricultural Land Acquisition for Urbanization for Household Gender Equality in Affected Rural Communes: A Case Study in Huong Thuy Town, Thua Thien Hue Province, Vietnam Reprinted from: Land 2020 , 9 , 249, doi:10.3390/land9080249 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 167 v Stefanie Lemke and Priscilla Claeys Absent Voices: Women and Youth in Communal Land Governance. Reflections on Methods and Process from Exploratory Research in West and East Africa Reprinted from: Land 2020 , 9 , 266, doi:10.3390/land9080266 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 187 Emmanuel Olatunbosun Benjamin Smallholder Agricultural Investment and Productivity under Contract Farming and Customary Tenure System: A Malawian Perspective Reprinted from: Land 2020 , 9 , 277, doi:10.3390/land9080277 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 201 Jae-hyuck Lee and Do-kyun Kim Mapping Environmental Conflicts Using Spatial Text Mining Reprinted from: Land 2020 , 9 , 287, doi:10.3390/land9090287 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 219 Wiwandari Handayani, Uchendu Eugene Chigbu, Iwan Rudiarto and Intan Hapsari Surya Putri Urbanization and Increasing Flood Risk in the Northern Coast of Central Java—Indonesia: An Assessment towards Better Land Use Policy and Flood Management Reprinted from: Land 2020 , 9 , 343, doi:10.3390/land9100343 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 229 Justin Lusasi and Dismas Mwaseba Gender Inequality and Symbolic Violence in Women’s Access to Family Land in the Southern Highlands of Tanzania Reprinted from: Land 2020 , 9 , 468, doi:10.3390/land9110468 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 251 Jae-hyuck Lee and Do-Kyun Kim Erratum: Lee, J.-H.; Kim, D.-K. Mapping Environmental Conflicts Using Spatial Text Mining. Land 2020, 9 , 287 Reprinted from: Land 2020 , 9 , 434, doi:10.3390/land9110434 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 265 vi About the Editor Uchendu Eugene Chigbu is an Associate Professor in Land Administration at the Department of Land and Property Sciences, the Namibia University of Science and Technology (NUST), in Windhoek. His works fall within the interface between Social Sciences and Geodesy (or Social Geodesy). He has more than 10 years of experience in the formulation of land methods for addressing societal challenges. His most impactful work in the field of land administration and management is “Tenure Responsive Land Use Planning: A Guide for Country Level Implementation”, which has been adopted by the UN-Habitat for piloting in the Global South. The concepts and practices from this document are currently being piloted in Uganda, the Philippines, Laos, and Zambia. Prior to joining NUST, he was a research scientist in land management at the Technical University of Munich (TUM), Germany. At TUM, he worked for 10 years in a variety of roles, including research, teaching, capacity development, institutional networking, and project sourcing/management. He is a multi-disciplinary consultant with diverse experience across a broad spectrum of land management specializations. His research and practice are focused on land administration and land management themes, including land-use planning, land and natural resource tenure, land policy and governance, and actions for transformations in urban, peri-urban, and rural settlements. He has multiple professional affiliations but is most active with the International Federation of Surveyors (FIG) and the Global Land Tool Network (GLTN). He is the Co-Chair of the International Training and Research Cluster of the GLTN and the Co-Chair of the Urban-Rural Dependency Working Group in Commission-8 of the FIG. He is highly published and sits on the Editorial Boards of the journals Land Use Policy (Elsevier) and Local Development & Society (Routledge). He is an active reviewer of more than 20 journals. vii Preface to “Land, Women, Youths, and Land Tools or Methods” The importance of land manifests in various components of the everyday lives of people in societies: cultural heritage, livelihood, the environment, economy, and community, among many others. Land is a factor of development. It is the most influential determinant of development because women, youths, and men (and households) depend on it for their livelihoods and for maintaining their living conditions in urban, peri-urban, and rural areas. However, in most cases, women and youth remain excluded from efforts towards securing land rights or the benefits that emanate from the use of land. This challenge persists due to a broad knowledge gap that exists on the land–women–youth–policy nexus of land management study and practice. The articles in this book explore lessons on the application of land tools (as promising solutions) for improving the living conditions of all, including women and youths. Collectively, the articles build a knowledge base for understanding the challenges that women and youths face (and possible strategies to resolve these challenges) in their quest to access, use, and secure land resources. It also presents various methods (tools and approaches) for tackling land administration and management challenges. This book reflects a broad research agenda in the field of land management and administration (including land governance and policy). It is a compendium of lessons on issues concerning women, youths, and tools in the context of land as a sustainable factor of development. It documents the concepts being designed, the impacts being experienced, and the progress being made in identifying suitable pathways for tackling the challenges faced by women and youths in relation to land and natural resources. Some of the studies presented in this book are adaptable to improving land-related problems in uncertain environments, such as situations that are encountered during the COVID-19 or coronavirus pandemic. The content of the book enriches the knowledge base for understanding essential changes that are required for the empowerment of women and youths, as well as in the development of techniques necessary for delivering women-and-youth-responsive outcomes. The wealth of insights into how to facilitate the implementation of methods needed for positive impacts in the land sector is a strength of this book. Contemporary scholars are encouraged to read the collection of articles in the book, as it will afford them free access to land governance information in their ongoing and future research. Uchendu Eugene Chigbu Editor ix land Editorial Land, Women, Youths, and Land Tools or Methods: Emerging Lessons for Governance and Policy Uchendu Eugene Chigbu Department of Land and Property Sciences, Faculty of Natural Resources and Spatial Sciences, University of Science and Technology, 13 Jackson Kaujeua Street, Private Bag 13388, Windhoek 9000, Khomas, Namibia; echigbu@nust.na; Tel.: + 264-61-207-2470 Received: 3 December 2020; Accepted: 8 December 2020; Published: 10 December 2020 Women and youths encounter problems with access to land, as well as securing tenure in land resources. Several researchers and organizations have dedicated their e ff orts to conceptualizing land tools for women’s and youths’ access to land. A land tool or land method is any practical means of solving land-related challenges. To ensure that land tools and methods produce pro-poor and inclusive impacts, they need to be developed to also incorporate youths’ and women’s experiences (including their needs and participation). This implies acknowledging that land tools or methods may impact di ff erently on women, men, and youths. The focus of this Special Issue (SI) “Land, Women, Youths, and Land Tools or Methods” is crucial for understanding the social aspects of land administration and land management. Land (a natural resource), women and youths (focusing on people), and land tools or methods (problem-solving techniques) share a mutually beneficial relationship (see Figure 1). Women & youths Land Land tools or methods Natural resource Problem- solving techniques People Figure 1. The relationship between land, women, youths, and land tools or methods (author’s illustration). Land 2020 , 9 , 507; doi:10.3390 / land9120507 www.mdpi.com / journal / land 1 Land 2020 , 9 , 507 Land , as a natural resource, is essential for ensuring that women and youths are part of the community (the critical demographic). This is because access to land provides physical availability of land parcels for women and youths to use or enjoy the rights embedded therein. Furthermore, it provides opportunities for them to improve their livelihoods and their households. Women and youths are more socioeconomically empowered when they have the right to inherit property, transfer their land rights to others, and exercise those rights in relation to water, housing, food, the forest, and environmental and mineral resources, to mention just a few. Without disregarding the problems that men encounter, there is a focus on women and youths because they are the demographic usually left behind in e ff orts aimed at securing land rights for all. However, e ff orts to secure land / property rights for women and youths would not be possible unless specifically tailored problem-solving techniques are adopted for solving women- and youth-related land challenges. Furthermore, people (women and youths, in this case) also need to understand their rights in order to use and enjoy land resources, as well as have the capacity to use land sustainably. This is how land, women and youths, and land tools or methods share mutually beneficial relationships (again, refer to Figure 1). With the exception of an Erratum article, the SI contains a total of 13 positively evaluated (peer-reviewed) articles. Therefore, the objective of this editorial is to highlight one key insight from each of these, thus compiling 13 lessons learned from the articles published in this SI. These 13 lessons learned are a selection only. A broader spectrum of insights and findings is available in the publications. A thematic review (and analysis) of the articles required a multidisciplinary perspective to grasp the variety of data types, as well as the collection and analytical methods used. A matrix-type thematic analysis is presented in a tabular format (Table 1). Table 1. Articles in the Special Issue (SI) ”Land, Women, Youths, and Land Tools or Methods” , listed in the order they are discussed in this editorial ( ‡ : primary focus area of publication; † : secondary focus; • : unaddressed theme). No. Title of Published Articles Key Subject Area Addressed in the SI Themes 1 L W Y LT G 1 Willingness to participate in voluntary land consolidation in Gozamin District, Ethiopia [1]. ‡ • • † Ethiopia (Africa) 2 Household land allocations and the youth land access nexus: evidence from the Techiman Area of Ghana [ 2 ]. ‡ • ‡ • Ghana (Africa) 3 The changing structure and concentration of agricultural landholdings in Estonia and possible threat for rural areas [3]. ‡ • • † Estonia (Europe) 4 Rural women’s invisible work in census and state rural development plans: The Argentinean Patagonian case [4]. ‡ ‡ • • Argentina (South America) 5 Community development through the empowerment of indigenous women in Cuetzalan Del Progreso, Mexico [5]. ‡ ‡ • † Mexico (North America) 6 The nexus between peri-urban transformation and customary land rights disputes: e ff ects on peri-urban development in Trede, Ghana [6]. ‡ • • † Ghana (Africa) 7 Using a gender-responsive land rights framework to assess youth land rights in rural Liberia [7]. ‡ • ‡ ‡ Liberia (Africa) 8 Benefits and constraints of the agricultural land acquisition for urbanization for household gender equality in a ff ected rural communes: A case study in Huong Thuy Town, Thua Thien Hue Province, Vietnam [8]. ‡ † • • Vietnam (Asia) 9 Absent voices: women and youths in communal land governance. Reflections on methods and processes from exploratory research in West and East Africa [ 9 ]. ‡ ‡ ‡ ‡ Guinea, Kenya, Mali, Tanzania, and Uganda (Africa) 2 Land 2020 , 9 , 507 Table 1. Cont. No. Title of Published Articles Key Subject Area Addressed in the SI Themes 1 L W Y LT G 10 Smallholder agricultural investment and productivity under contract farming and customary tenure system: a Malawian perspective [10]. ‡ † • • Malawi (Africa) 11 Mapping environmental conflict using spatial text mining: focusing on the regional issues of South Korean environmental NGOs [11]. ‡ • • ‡ South Korea (Asia) 12 Urbanization and increasing flood risk on the northern coast of Central Java – Indonesia: an assessment towards better land use policy and flood management [12]. ‡ • • ‡ Indonesia (Asia) 13 Gender inequality and symbolic violence in women’s access to family land in the Southern Highlands of Tanzania [13]. ‡ ‡ • † Tanzania (Africa) 1 L = Land; W = Women; Y = Youths; LT = Land tools or methods; G = Geography. Two key inferences can be drawn from the data presented in Table 1. First, all articles in the SI have land as a primary focus, followed by issues about women, land tools or methods, and youths, respectively. Second, while the geographical focus of the articles leaned predominantly towards Africa, the entire volume is representative of countries from all regions of the world. The SI, therefore, addresses land, women, youths, and land tools or methods from a global perspective. The 13 articles in the SI are authored by 37 land and natural resource scholars. They collectively produced 13 notable lessons [1–13]. Below is an outline of the lessons learned. Lesson one: Landholder farmers are predominantly willing to participate in voluntary land consolidation. The study conducted by Gedefaw et al. [ 1 ] evaluated the willingness of farmers to participate in land consolidation in Ethiopia. They revealed that landholder farmers are more willing to participate in voluntary land consolidation than in compulsory land consolidation. The study identified motivations or determinants for their willingness: (1) land exchange in a consolidation process is preferable between neighboring parcels of adjacent farmers; (2) nearness of parcels to the farmstead; and (3) expected productivity improvement. Lesson two: A social welfare scheme is necessary for aged farmers to provide youths easier access and security to the use of land. Concerning the growing lack of access to land by youths in most developing countries, Kidido and Lengoiboni’s [ 12 ] study on Ghana underscores the need for a social welfare scheme for aged farmers to encourage earlier transfer of land to the youth to enable easier access to land. Lesson three: Policy action is urgently needed in Europe to mitigate the impact of land concentration caused by the increasing concentration of agricultural land into the hands of corporate bodies. Focusing away from Africa, Jürgenson and Rasva [ 3 ] studied the farmland situation in Europe where the area of agricultural land has remained almost the same, despite a decreasing trend in the number of farms on the continent. They found, with a particular focus on Estonia, that “Agricultural land has been increasingly concentrated into the hands of corporate bodies” [ 3 ] (p. 1). Hence, the need for a policy direction to mitigate the impact of land concentration. Lesson four: A strategy for the economic and political recognition of women’s contribution to regional development through their land-based activities is a necessary intervention for gender-inclusive and equitable planning. Concerning the issue of women’s land rights in South America, N ú ñez et al. [ 4 ] investigated the historical census data from Argentina and found that women’s contributions to the family farming system in the Patagonian region remain unrecognized, and this has caused the invisibilization of women’s contributions to development. They found that the system of data usage leads to women being denied their rights to family land use. The consequence is that “Patagonia has become one of the most a ff ected by extractivism” [ 4 ] (p. 1). They, therefore, recommended that a strategy for the 3 Land 2020 , 9 , 507 economic and political recognition of women’s contributions to development (through land-based activities) is a necessary intervention for gender-inclusive and equitable planning. Lesson five: An “inclusive legal and institutional framework” leads to the segregation of Indigenous communities when (or where) policy implementation is weak; however, community development approaches can help. The study by Dur á n-D í az et al. [ 5 ] is a regionally relevant work that overlaps between cultural Latin America and geographical North America. They investigated “the status of Indigenous rural women, as well as the mechanisms and impacts of their empowerment” (p. 1). It presents a community development approach as a women-focused land tool or method—based on the Masehual Siuamej Mosenyolchicacauani organization in Cuetzalan del Progreso, Puebla—to ensure more e ff ective implementation of programs meant to desegregate Indigenous communities. Lesson six: A land-use plan meant to convert rural lands into urban plots can become a trigger of tenurial changes and customary land rights disputes. Owusu Ansah and Chigbu [ 6 ], in another study on Ghana (Africa), explored the link between peri-urban transformation and emerging customary land rights (CLR) disputes in peri-urban geographies. They found that a land-use plan implemented to develop a functional peri-urban land market contributed to CLR disputes. Going forward, they [ 6 ] proposed measures for peri-urban land management and CLR dispute prevention. Lesson seven: For a Land Rights Act of a country to become responsive to the needs of the youth, a precondition is to embrace community-level interventions. Louis et al.’s [ 7 ] study provides insights into the land rights situation of youths in Liberia. They argued for the implementation of the country’s Land Rights Act to embrace community-level interventions to improve youth land tenure security in the country. This study provides a land tool (or methods) perspective by using a gender-responsive land rights framework that examines youth land rights through a gender lens. Lesson eight: Where (and when) agricultural land is acquired for urbanization, it can lead to an increase in the economic status of women in households whose land was acquired. The study by Pham Thi et al. [8] explored agricultural land acquisition for urbanization (ALAFU) in Vietnam. Their key finding indicates that ALAFU has increased the economic status of women in households whose agricultural land was acquired for urbanization. Taking structural gender inequalities into account in agricultural-to-urban land acquisition can be a veritable strategy for achieving gender-responsive sustainable development goals. Lesson nine: Responsible governance of communal natural resources is only possible when the voices of the disempowered segment of communities, especially those of the women and youth, are heard and respected. This study by Lemke and Claeys [ 9 ] explored natural resource governance from a communal perspective, and with a specific focus on the empowerment of women and youths through the promotion of their right to be heard in communal land matters. A point of methodological interest is that they adapted participatory action research (PAR) to the COVID-19 situation. Hence, they present how PAR can be applied under uncertain situations. Lesson ten: Matrilocal practices positively influence agricultural investment, but even in such a women-friendly customary system, women remain insecure in their landholding. In this study, Benjamin [ 10 ] investigates the impact of the customary residence system on agricultural investment, with a particular focus on tea shrub and agroforestry, and productivity among contracted smallholder tea out-growers in southern Malawi. The study concluded that despite the dominance of matrilineal–matrilocal systems in Southern Malawi, there is a need for policy to address gender gaps in the region because women are still insecure in their access and use of land. Spatial text mining can provide evidence of variability in the degrees of environmental conflict sensitivity, geographically or regionally, leading to policy-relevant information for land or environmental management. Lee and Kim’s study [ 11 ] found that air quality-related conflicts in South Korea are concentrated in the western municipalities, development-related conflicts are concentrated in the southern region of Jeju Island, and intensive safety-related conflicts occur in the metropolitan areas (especially the city of Ulsan). Their data, when presented in the form of an environmental map, is capable of being used as a tool for country-level land and environmental management decisions. 4 Land 2020 , 9 , 507 Land policies are necessary for guiding sustainable flood management in coastal cities and riverine areas. Handayani et al.’s study [ 12 ] explored the relationship between urbanization and flood events on the northern coast of Central Java using the river basin as the basis of unit analysis. Their findings show that the growth rate of the built-up area is significantly related to the occurrence of flood events. The study concluded that river basins have a dual spatial identity in the urban system (policy and land-use related). They recommended “problematizing urbanizing river basins” as “an opportunity for an eco-based approach to tackling the urban flood crises”. Lesson thirteen: Gender inequality and symbolic violence in women’s access to family land can be improved through the use of dialectical communication between women and men. Lusasi and Mwaseba [ 13 ] investigated land-related gender scenarios in selected villages in the Southern Highlands of Tanzania and found that cases of tree-planting surges in the region cause gender inequality and symbolic violence in women’s access to family land. The study advanced a communication tool to reduce gender disparity in land issues. They recommended the use of dialectical communication between women and men to reveal and heal practices of symbolic violence in land accessibility, control, and ownership. Funding: This research received no external funding. Acknowledgments: I would like to acknowledge all the reviewers who participated in evaluating the articles published in the Special Issue (SI) “Land: Women, Youths, and Land Tools or Methods.” Without these reviewers, it would not have been possible to complete this SI project. I am personally indebted to some specific individuals who helped throughout the period of the SI. These include Walter Dachaga, Barikisa Owusu Ansah, Cheonjae Lee, Gaynor Paradza, Prince Donkor Ameyaw, and Ernest Uwayezu. I want to thank the editorial team of Land journal. Special thanks go to Cosette Yuan, Janie Liu, Aguero Gui, Costin Hao, Jenney Li, Milica Kovaˇ cevi ́ c, and Zoey Gao. I would also like to thank all the authors of the accepted and rejected manuscripts for responding to the call leading to this SI volume. Together, these authors (for submitting their articles) have enriched the knowledge base of what is known about land, women and youths, and land tools or methods. I would also like to thank the Global Land Tool Network (GLTN) and the International Federation of Surveyors (FIG). My respective roles as a Co-Chair of the GLTN Cluster and FIG Commission Working Group in these organizations motivated the conceptualization of this SI project. Conflicts of Interest: The author declares no conflict of interest. References 1. Gedefaw, A.A.; Atzberger, C.; Seher, W.; Mansberger, R. Farmers willingness to participate in voluntary land consolidation in Gozamin District, Ethiopia. Land 2019 , 8 , 148. [CrossRef] 2. Kidido, J.K.; Lengoiboni, M. Household land allocations and the youth land access nexus: Evidence from the Techiman Area of Ghana. Land 2019 , 8 , 185. [CrossRef] 3. Jürgenson, E.; Rasva, M. The Changing structure and concentration of agricultural land holdings in Estonia and possible threat for rural areas. Land 2020 , 9 , 41. [CrossRef] 4. N ú ñez, P.G.; Michel, C.L.; Leal Tejeda, P.A.; N ú ñez, M.A. Rural women’s invisible work in census and state rural development plans: The Argentinean Patagonian Case. Land 2020 , 9 , 92. [CrossRef] 5. Dur á n-D í az, P.; Armenta-Ram í rez, A.; Kurjenoja, A.K.; Schumacher, M. Community development through the empowerment of indigenous women in Cuetzalan Del Progreso, Mexico. Land 2020 , 9 , 163. [CrossRef] 6. Owusu Ansah, B.; Chigbu, U.E. The nexus between peri-urban transformation and customary land rights disputes: E ff ects on peri-urban development in Trede, Ghana. Land 2020 , 9 , 187. [CrossRef] 7. Louis, E.; Mauto, T.; Dodd, M.L.; Heidenrich, T.; Dolo, P.; Urey, E. Using a gender-responsive land rights framework to assess youth land rights in rural Liberia. Land 2020 , 9 , 247. [CrossRef] 8. Pham Thi, N.; Kappas, M.; Wyss, D. Benefits and constraints of the agricultural land acquisition for urbanization for household gender equality in a ff ected rural communes: A case study in Huong Thuy Town, Thua Thien Hue Province, Vietnam. Land 2020 , 9 , 249. [CrossRef] 9. Lemke, S.; Claeys, P. Absent Voices: Women and Youth in Communal Land Governance. Reflections on methods and process from exploratory research in West and East Africa. Land 2020 , 9 , 266. [CrossRef] 10. Benjamin, E.O. Smallholder Agricultural Investment and Productivity under Contract Farming and Customary Tenure System: A Malawian Perspective. Land 2020 , 9 , 277. [CrossRef] 11. Lee, J.; Kim, D. Mapping environmental conflict using spatial text mining: Focusing on the regional issues of South Korean environmental NGOs. Land 2020 , 9 , 287. [CrossRef] 5 Land 2020 , 9 , 507 12. Handayani, W.; Chigbu, U.E.; Rudiarto, I.; Intan, H.S.P. Urbanization and Increasing Flood Risk in the Northern Coast of Central Java—Indonesia: An Assessment towards Better Land Use Policy and Flood Management. Land 2020 , 9 , 343. [CrossRef] 13. Lusasi, J.; Mwaseba, D. Gender inequality and symbolic violence in women’s access to family land in the Southern Highlands of Tanzania. Land 2020 , 9 , 468. [CrossRef] Publisher’s Note: MDPI stays neutral with regard to jurisdictional claims in published maps and institutional a ffi liations. © 2020 by the author. Licensee MDPI, Basel, Switzerland. This article is an open access article distributed under the terms and conditions of the Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY) license (http: // creativecommons.org / licenses / by / 4.0 / ). 6 land Article Farmers Willingness to Participate In Voluntary Land Consolidation in Gozamin District, Ethiopia Abebaw Andarge Gedefaw 1,2, *, Clement Atzberger 1 , Walter Seher 3 and Reinfried Mansberger 1 1 Institute of Surveying, Remote Sensing and Land Information, University of Natural Resources and Life Sciences Vienna, Peter-Jordan-Strasse 82, 1190 Vienna, Austria; clement.atzberger@boku.ac.at (C.A.); mansberger@boku.ac.at (R.M.) 2 Institute of Land Administration, Debre Markos University, 269 Debre Markos, Ethiopia 3 Institute of Spatial Planning, Environmental Planning and Land Rearrangement, University of Natural Resources and Life Sciences Vienna, Peter-Jordan-Strasse 82, 1190 Vienna, Austria; walter.seher@boku.ac.at * Correspondence: abebaw.gedefaw@students.boku.ac.at Received: 10 September 2019; Accepted: 10 October 2019; Published: 12 October 2019 Abstract: In many African countries and especially in the highlands of Ethiopia—the investigation site of this paper—agricultural land is highly fragmented. Small and scattered parcels impede a necessary increase in agricultural e ffi ciency. Land consolidation is a proper tool to solve ine ffi ciencies in agricultural production, as it enables consolidating plots based on the consent of landholders. Its major benefits are that individual farms get larger, more compact, contiguous parcels, resulting in lower cultivation e ff orts. This paper investigates the determinants influencing the willingness of landholder farmers to participate in voluntary land consolidation processes. The study was conducted in Gozamin District, Amhara Region, Ethiopia. The study was mainly based on survey data collected from 343 randomly selected landholder farmers. In addition, structured interviews and focus group discussions with farmers were held. The collected data were analyzed quantitatively mainly by using a logistic regression model and qualitatively by using focus group discussions and expert panels. According to the results, landholder farmers are predominantly willing to participate in voluntary land consolidation (66.8%), while a substantive fraction of farmers express unease with voluntary land consolidation. The study highlighted the following four determinants to be significant in influencing the willingness of farmers for voluntary land consolidation: (1) the exchange should preferably happen with parcels of neighbors, (2) land consolidation should lead to better arranged parcels, (3) nearness of plots to the farmstead, and (4) an expected improvement in productivity. Interestingly, the majority of farmers believes that land consolidation could reduce land use conflicts. The study provides evidence that policymakers should consider these socio-economic, legal, cultural, infrastructural, and land-related factors when designing and implementing voluntary land consolidation policies and programs. Keywords: voluntary land consolidation; land fragmentation; maximum likelihood estimation; logistic regression model; sustainable land management; land exchange; rural development 1. Introduction Land is a scarce resource in Ethiopia, a country whose population relies on farming as the primary source of livelihood [ 1 ]. As farming is an essential factor in the Ethiopian economy, land utilization and allocation is an important undertaking in the country [ 2 ]. Agriculture is dominating the economy in Ethiopia; it accounts for 37% of the gross domestic product (GDP), which is one of the highest shares in Sub-Saharan Africa. However, landholdings are often fragmented into small parcels; the average total farm land area per smallholder household is 0.78 hectare, and it is likely to decline further. Land 2019 , 8 , 148; doi:10.3390 / land8100148 www.mdpi.com / journal / land 7 Land 2019 , 8 , 148 The average number of plots constituting a household farm is four [ 3 ]. Thus, Ethiopian smallholder agriculture is characterized by extremely small farms fragmented into several plots and cultivated in a labor-intensive manner while supporting relatively large families. Many of these farms are too small to meet subsistence needs, particularly when using traditional technology and currently available resources [ 4 , 5 ]. Fragmentation has led to farmers neglecting strips of land far from their houses, leading to reduced agricultural output. The impact of land fragmentation is that farming becomes more and more di ffi cult, expensive, and labor intensive, especially against the background of an expected mechanization of the farming sector in Ethiopia [ 6 ]. Adverse e ff ects of land fragmentation have been observed in many countries where spatially separated parcels of land hinder mechanization and increase the likelihood of disputes [6,7]. Land fragmentation is defined as a situation where farmers are cultivating two or more geographically separated plots of land by taking into account the distances between those parcels [ 8 ]. Bentley explains land fragmentation as a type of land ownership, where a single farm consists of numerous discrete parcels [ 9 ]. Problems often associated with land fragmentation are small sizes, irregular shapes, and dispersed parcels, resulting in higher e ff orts for cultivation [ 10 , 11 ]. It can be summarized that land fragmentation is not beneficial in terms of agricultural development [12,13]. The studies mentioned above tackle di ff erent aspects of land fragmentation. Land fragmentation can be considered from a cultivation perspective, taking into account agricultural production such as variety of crops, quality of soil, and water conditions. In this respect, land fragmentation can also be beneficial by providing a distribution of plots according to the variety of agricultural site qualities. It also can be seen from a land administration perspective considering the geometry (e.g., shape, area, slopes) as well as the land rights (e.g., land ownership, land tenure) [ 14 ]. Another aspect would be an environmental one, where cultivation of small parcels is more likely to provide higher biodiversity. The perspective on land fragmentation is also dependent on di ff erent stakeholders. These can be farmers, planners, land administrators, environmentalists, agro-economists, etc. Furthermore, perceptions of land fragmentation vary between countries. In this study, the investigations were focused on Ethiopia and on the viewpoints of farmers. Thus, cultivation and land administration perspectives on land fragmentation were in the foreground. Land fragmentation is both an indicator and the result of a (frequently problematic) land tenure structure. In some regions, land fragmentation becomes a major problem because it restricts agricultural development and reduces the opportunities for sustainable rural development. Policies to counter land fragmentation are needed for social, economic, and environmental reasons [ 11 ] (see also Table 1). Table 1. Major reasons why policies are needed to counter land fragmentation. Reason Type Reason Social to decrease disputes amongst neighbors to develop team work Economic to increase production to enable self-su ffi ciency in food production Environmental to enhance soil quality to protect water availability to balance climatic condition Source: Demetriou, D., et al. 2013. A new methodology for measuring land fragmentation. Even if farmland fragmentation is widespread and may a ff ect farmers’ decisions, it can influence farm performance either negatively or positively. Usually, the term land fragmentation is associated with small parcel sizes, improper shapes of individual parcels, long distances of parcels from homestead, and long distances between parcels [ 15 ]. Experiences with quantifying the impact of land fragmentation on agricultural production e ffi ciency reveals the negative association. Studies done in Nigeria show that farmers’ landholdings are fragmented, small in size, non-contiguous, and interspersed. Fragmentation of holdings had negative implications for agricultural development [ 16 ]. Also, studies in South-East 8 Land 2019 , 8 , 148 China reveal that land fragmentation can be an important determinant of technical e ffi ciency in rice production. An increase in average plot size increases rice farmers’ cultivation e ffi ciency and vice versa [ 17 ]. Another study in Nigeria reveals that land fragmentation a ff ects production e ffi ciency by the finding that there is a negative correlation between amount of fragmented land and yield [18] Even though policy makers often point out the draw backs of land fragmentation, there is no consensus that fragmentation is strictly a negative phenomenon. Bentley argues that the negatives caused by fragmented land holdings are overrated and that the farmers’ own views often are neglected by policy makers [ 9 ]. Bentley also documents positive aspects of land fragmentation, such as variety of soil and growing conditions reducing the risk of total crop failure. Plots spread over an area sometimes implies micro-climatic variations and multiple ecological zones. Fragmentation also facilitates crop rotation [ 9 ]. Additionally, farmers can take advantage of minor di ff erences in local agroecology [ 19 ], as they can hedge risk through spatial dispersion [