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Tanintharyi Region Starts Palm Oil Sector Land Review
Tanintharyi Region Starts Palm Oil Sector Land Review
12/10/2016 (Myanmar Times) - The Tanintharyi region government is planning an oil palm-sector assessment project as part of an effort to help solve land use issues in the region.
The government held a workshop on October 8 with participation from a variety of civil society organisations and representatives from local and ethnic groups, which began the process of forming a committee to lead the project, said U Shwe Thein, executive director of Land Core Group, which promotes policy debate on land issues and is supporting the project.
The leading committee will include stakeholders from the regional government, civil society organizations, oil-palm companies and representatives from local and ethnic groups, he said.
This assessment will examine how much land is owned by palm oil companies, how much of that is currently being used for actual production and how the land is farmed, he said.
Priorities for the next three months were discussed at the recent workshop, and include agreeing on standards and methodology, selecting which area to start surveying and the process of collecting satellite images, U Shwe Thein added.
The OneMap Myanmar Project is supporting the assessment. This eight-year initiative began in 2015 implemented jointly by the University of Bern’s Centre for Development and Environment (CDE) and LCG. The One Map project aims to develop an “open-access spatial data platform on land issues”, according to CDE.
U Thant Zin, coordinator for the Dawei Development Association (DDA), said that land use issues “seemed to arise almost every day”, and that it was positive that all stakeholders were coming together to resolve the issues.
“Palm oil companies have bought up huge amounts of land in the region,” he said. “In some cases the land had been occupied by people for a long time, or is in a conservation area. But previous governments failed to manage land issues and many are still in need of resolution.”
Some larger plots in Tanintharyi Region were confiscated by the military government, which ordered private companies to meet agriculture production goals in the 1990s and 2000s, U Hlwan Moe, director of the Agricultural Land Management and Statistics Department, previously told The Myanmar Times.
Tanintharyi Region’s chief minister Daw Lae Lae Maw announced in August that the regional government was surveying unused land and submitted its findings to the regional government. That survey is designed to return some land confiscated by the military government back to original owners or displaced workers in order to let them cultivate small-scale farms.
Under the Vacant, Fallow and Virgin Lands Management Law of 2012, the state has the right to take back farmland if it has not been cultivated for four years after an initial land-lease agreement contract is signed.
Sai Myint Thein, a director at AsiaWorld, said that today’s land use issues are the result of the old administration forcing companies into agricultural projects and not negotiating with local communities.
AsiaWorld is suing two villagers in Band Mae village, Myeik district, for destroying palm oil trees. Civil society groups say the villagers left their land in the 1990s because of the fighting between the Karen National Union and the Tatmadaw. Although they are now ready to return, AsiaWorld and other firms have set up plantations on the land.
Sai Myint Thein said that AsiaWorld is willing to return land that it has not used for production if that is what the regional government’s new policy dictates.
“We are ready to return that land,” he said, adding that the palm oil business is in many cases not going particularly well. “It’s not a successful business for most oil palm companies, because we can’t produce edible palm oil, we end up with oil that can only be used for soap.”
The government held a workshop on October 8 with participation from a variety of civil society organisations and representatives from local and ethnic groups, which began the process of forming a committee to lead the project, said U Shwe Thein, executive director of Land Core Group, which promotes policy debate on land issues and is supporting the project.
The leading committee will include stakeholders from the regional government, civil society organizations, oil-palm companies and representatives from local and ethnic groups, he said.
This assessment will examine how much land is owned by palm oil companies, how much of that is currently being used for actual production and how the land is farmed, he said.
Priorities for the next three months were discussed at the recent workshop, and include agreeing on standards and methodology, selecting which area to start surveying and the process of collecting satellite images, U Shwe Thein added.
The OneMap Myanmar Project is supporting the assessment. This eight-year initiative began in 2015 implemented jointly by the University of Bern’s Centre for Development and Environment (CDE) and LCG. The One Map project aims to develop an “open-access spatial data platform on land issues”, according to CDE.
U Thant Zin, coordinator for the Dawei Development Association (DDA), said that land use issues “seemed to arise almost every day”, and that it was positive that all stakeholders were coming together to resolve the issues.
“Palm oil companies have bought up huge amounts of land in the region,” he said. “In some cases the land had been occupied by people for a long time, or is in a conservation area. But previous governments failed to manage land issues and many are still in need of resolution.”
Some larger plots in Tanintharyi Region were confiscated by the military government, which ordered private companies to meet agriculture production goals in the 1990s and 2000s, U Hlwan Moe, director of the Agricultural Land Management and Statistics Department, previously told The Myanmar Times.
Tanintharyi Region’s chief minister Daw Lae Lae Maw announced in August that the regional government was surveying unused land and submitted its findings to the regional government. That survey is designed to return some land confiscated by the military government back to original owners or displaced workers in order to let them cultivate small-scale farms.
Under the Vacant, Fallow and Virgin Lands Management Law of 2012, the state has the right to take back farmland if it has not been cultivated for four years after an initial land-lease agreement contract is signed.
Sai Myint Thein, a director at AsiaWorld, said that today’s land use issues are the result of the old administration forcing companies into agricultural projects and not negotiating with local communities.
AsiaWorld is suing two villagers in Band Mae village, Myeik district, for destroying palm oil trees. Civil society groups say the villagers left their land in the 1990s because of the fighting between the Karen National Union and the Tatmadaw. Although they are now ready to return, AsiaWorld and other firms have set up plantations on the land.
Sai Myint Thein said that AsiaWorld is willing to return land that it has not used for production if that is what the regional government’s new policy dictates.
“We are ready to return that land,” he said, adding that the palm oil business is in many cases not going particularly well. “It’s not a successful business for most oil palm companies, because we can’t produce edible palm oil, we end up with oil that can only be used for soap.”