Quant vs Qual Assessment of Land Grabs
A colleague of mine at the Lowy Institute (thanks Fergus) made me aware of this interesting blog piece by Deborah Brautigam on the accurateness of statistics in reports and writings about land grabs in Africa. She takes aim at the statistics of IFPRI, GRAIN and FAO (this was before the World Bank put out a major study that showed nothing new) and shows that in some cases the empirical evidence used to compile these stats is solely based on inaccurate or questionable media reports. Similarly I noticed that media reports (aggregated and archived here) often also not shy away from speculating on the potential impacts of land grabs; painting pictures of 'neo-colonialism' and dwelling on the devastating circumstances for the local rural population. But without any in-depth investigation it is difficult to grasp the true nature of these 'foreign agricultural investments' -- as I prefer to call land grabs.
People are naturally interested in numbers and statistics -- see for example this insightful BBC documentary by Hans Rosling on "The Joy of Stats". So in the case of land grabs it is certainly appealing to quantify the 'great global land grab' (the Economist gave it a shot), yet at the same time it is an incredibly difficult task and perhaps not even a very useful undertaking. While a rough determination of the spread, size and location of these land grabs provides a starting point for subsequent research, I keep wondering how beneficial it is to our understanding of the phenomenon and its impacts to compile provisional -- and probably highly disputable -- statistics. How helpful is knowing the total amount of foreign investment in US dollars or calculating the exact number of hectares sold and leased between 2007 and 2010?
But let me be clear, my assessment of land grab statistics is framed in a human security, human development and human rights framework. Hence my concern with land grabs is primarily focused on the consequences and impacts for the local population -- and specifically in term of food security. Still, a quantitative assessment of land grabs can be helpful. Say, we find that there is an increasing number of reports on foreign investment in African agriculture, repeatedly naming several African countries to host these deals. This allows us to compile some rough and provisional statistics to facilitate directing subsequent research. But, as Deborah Brautigam points out, we need to be aware that some of these widely reported land grabs are already cancelled, dismissed, or will simply remain unimplemented. Even more, details of many land deals are extremely vague; the deals are often of an opaque nature in terms of rights and obligations, tentatively negotiated, mostly in early pre-implementation stage, regularly contain secretive provisions, or simply lack any specifics. Hence, to understand the spread and consequences of land grabs we need to engage in-depth and case-specific examinations before we can even hope to compile somewhat accurate statistics and make sensible statements about the consequences of these deals.
Within a humanitarian framework we can use quantitative global estimates to identify patterns, inform our research and direct our focus. But it is the qualitative nature of foreign agricultural investment that enables us to get insights into the real-life implications of land deals. How does it affect a region, what are the consequences for communities living on or close to the land, and how does it changes the lives of these local people? I believe it is these questions that deserve more attention.
On the moment I'm making the final preparations for six months of research in Kenya to address these questions. From the 5th of February I will be based in Nairobi to investigate how Kenyans address these matters of foreign agricultural investment in relation to their food- and human security.
[Photo: biofuel crops by Flickr user norte | sur]