Zambia’s peasants at risk of becoming squatters on their own land – UN expert warns

LUSAKA / GENEVA (12 May 2017) – The United Nations Special Rapporteur on the right to food, Hilal Elver, today cautioned that many Zambian peasants are at risk of becoming squatters on their own land as Zambia is turned into Southern Africa’s food basket.

“The push to turn commercial large-scale agricultural into a driving engine of the Zambian economy, in a situation where the protection of access to land is weak, can risk pushing small-holder farmers and peasants off their land and out of production with severe impacts on the people’s right to food,” Ms. Elver said at the end of her first official visit to the country.

The expert drew special attention to the fact that in the Zambian dual-model of land tenure tenants on state land enjoy the full protection of their property rights. “However,” she noted, “landholders under customary tenure, affecting around 85% of the land, mostly in hands of peasants, are essentially occupants or users of land and their property and land rights remain unprotected.”

“This situation is particularly alarming since small scale farmers represent 60% of Zambians and at the same time produce 85% of the food for the population,” Ms. Elver pointed out. “These people are generally amongst the poorest of the population, 40% of them live in rural areas and suffer from extreme poverty.”

“Many peasants are forced to work as contract farmers for the larger commercial industrial farms in adverse conditions, or are obliged to sell their products at undervalued prices to monopoly type multinationals who buy farmers’ product for export,” the expert explained.

The Special Rapporteur heard testimonies of comparatively successful small-scale farmers who were still forced to sell their animals in order to pay for their children to go to school. Many small-scale farmers have their children working from as early as the age of six to secure their families’ livelihood.

Ms. Elver noted that the growth in the agriculture sector in Zambia in the last decade has not been inclusive but limited to large scale farmers, leaving the small scale farmers behind. “The agricultural sector has failed to make a dent on poverty levels in the rural areas and as such the model for the strengthening of the agricultural sectors need to be altered,” she said.

“It is imperative that national strategies incorporate human rights principles that include the protection of their access to land and other productive resources in order to protect the county’s traditional food system, small holder farmers and their livelihoods,” the Special Rapporteur urged.

Access to adequate and nutritious food continues to be a challenge across most of the country, with women and children in the rural area faring worst. Many children and their families only eat only one meal of not necessarily nutritious food per day.
A recent study has found that severe acute malnutrition in Zambia comes with a 40% mortality rate, five times the global average due to lack in access to adequate health services as well as to therapeutic foods.

The expert was alarmed to find out that around 40% of children under five are stunted with this figure reaching above 50% in some of the rural provinces, and even higher in refugee camps and the most marginalized rural areas, while the country was enjoying impressive economic growth rates of over 6 per cent per year.

“This is not tolerable since the effects of under-nutrition are irreversible, and lack of access to adequate and nutritious food is having a detrimental effect on future generations and must be addressed as a matter of urgency,” she stressed.

The country’s agricultural development model based on intensive commercial farming has increased rates of deforestation and to bio-diversity loss. It has also increased the use of agro chemicals, including glyphosate, which have  a scientifically proven adverse impact on human health, in particular on children.

“It is vital that development plans and policies take into account the true cost of industrial farming methods primarily for its people, but also on soil and water resources, as well as the social and economic impact on people rather than focusing only on short term profitability and economic growth,” Ms. Elver said.

During her ten-day visit, the expert met, among others, senior Government officials, representatives from the UN system, civil society members, traditional leaders and communities in various locations throughout the country.

The Special Rapporteur’s observations and recommendations will be reflected in her final report, which will be presented to the UN Human Rights Council in March 2018.

Ms. Hilal Elver (Turkey) was appointed Special Rapporteur on the right to food by the  Human Rights Council in 2014. She is a Research Professor, co-director of the Project on Global Climate Change, Human Security and Democracy housed at the Orfalea Center for Global & International Studies, and global distinguished fellow at the University of California Los Angeles Law School (UCLA) Resnick Food Law and Policy Center.

The Special Rapporteurs are part of what is known as the Special Procedures of the Human Rights Council. Special Procedures, the largest body of independent experts in the UN Human Rights system, is the general name of the Council’s independent fact-finding and monitoring mechanisms that address either specific country situations or thematic issues in all parts of the world. Special Procedures’ experts work on a voluntary basis; they are not UN staff and do not receive a salary for their work. They are independent from any government or organization and serve in their individual capacity.

UN Human Rights, Country Page: Zambia

For more information and press inquiries, please contact:
In Lusaka (during the visit): Lavender Degre  ( +260211386231 / +260 0966797779 /  lavender.degre@undp.org) or Viktoria Aberg (+ 41 79 752 0483 / vaberg@ohchr.org)
In Geneva (after the visit): Frederike Jansonuis (+41 22 917 9339 / fjansonius@ohchr.org) or Viktoria Aberg (+ 41 22 917 9790 / vaberg@ohchr.org)

For media inquiries related to other UN independent experts:
Xabier Celaya – Media Unit (+ 41 22 917 9383 / xcelaya@ohchr.org)  

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