Posted July 1998

An FAO project

Private sector tenancy arrangements

EVIDENCE FROM MANY COUNTRIES indicates that the proportion of privately owned agricultural land available for letting is largely determined by the degree of statutory regulation that exists, limiting the freedom of landlords to negotiate the terms of land leases. While recognising that the landlord/tenant relationship provides many benefits for both parties, there has been concern that the bargaining powers of the tenant are generally weaker than those of the landowner, necessitating intervention by Governments to redress the balance. The old methods of compulsory acquisition and redistribution of land no longer find favour and the long term effect of such state intervention, while seeking to provide protection for the tenant, has actually been to limit or reduce access to suitable agricultural land and to encourage alternative methods of letting, outside of the imposed regulations.

The purpose of this project is to draw together details of current leasing practice throughout Europe, Asia, Africa and South America, in order to examine the landlord/tenant relationship in the agricultural sector and to extract examples of good practice which are likely to be of value to other countries. Ultimately, the aim is to produce authoritative guidance for the successful regulation of the landlord/tenant relationship to achieve a viable tenanted sector in the agricultural economy of UN member countries. Given the extensive privatisation of land that is taking place in the PHARE and TACIS countries and the new systems that are being established to promote efficient and sustainable use of the land, the outcome will therefore be of particular importance to Eastern Europe.

There are two sections and three elements to the research:

• Phase I - a review of the existing literature on agricultural tenure and tenancy arrangements and the publication of position papers detailing and discussing the issues involved; and
• Phase II - the production of guidelines for good practice in the regulation of agricultural tenancies.

The project is being led by Simon Keith, Senior Officer (Land Tenure and Settlement), Land Tenure Service in the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO). A study of the tenancy arrangements in Europe has been undertaken by Dr Neil Ravenscroft and a team from the University of Surrey in the UK, while Asia, Africa and South America have been the responsibility of Dr Susana Lastarria-Cornhiel and colleagues at the Land Tenure Center at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. Phase I has now been completed and has led to two draft literature reviews:

• Europe, Volumes I & II, by the University of Surrey
• Asia, Africa and South America, by the University of Wisconsin

and two draft position papers:

• "Private Sector Tenancy Arrangements: Europe, Volume III, Position Paper" by the University of Surrey
• and "Development of Good Practice Guidelines for Land Leasing: Some Preliminary Considerations" by the University of Wisconsin

These documents are being made available for downloading via FTP (in MS-Word 6.0, zipped) - see download information below.

Comments from interested parties are invited on these draft documents, prior to Phase II of the project - the production of guidelines for best practice in agricultural leasing. Please note that the deadline for comments is 25 August 1998. If you wish to express an opinion or to comment on any aspect of the documents or the research, please contact:

Mrs Susan Markwell
e.mail: Smarkwell1@aol.com
telephone/fax: +44 (0) 1344 891612

Private Sector Tenancy Arrangements: Draft reports

Title	Browse Table of contents & introduction (HTML)	Download full document (MS-Word 6.0, zipped)
Private sector tenancy arrangements, Europe I. Literature review; II. Annotated summary of literature & legislation; III. Position paper		205K
Land tenancy in Asia, Africa and Latin America		79K
Development of good practice guidelines for land leasing		15K