𝐂𝐢𝐯𝐢𝐥 𝐒𝐨𝐜𝐢𝐞𝐭𝐲 𝐔𝐧𝐢𝐭𝐞𝐬 𝐚𝐭 𝐈𝐂𝐀𝐑𝐑𝐃+𝟐𝟎: 𝐏𝐫𝐨𝐭𝐞𝐜𝐭 𝐂𝐨𝐥𝐥𝐞𝐜𝐭𝐢𝐯𝐞 𝐋𝐚𝐧𝐝𝐬, 𝐑𝐞𝐬𝐭𝐨𝐫𝐞 𝐑𝐚𝐧𝐠𝐞𝐥𝐚𝐧𝐝𝐬, 𝐚𝐧𝐝 𝐒𝐞𝐜𝐮𝐫𝐞 𝐏𝐚𝐬𝐭𝐨𝐫𝐚𝐥𝐢𝐬𝐭 𝐅𝐮𝐭𝐮𝐫𝐞𝐬

Ahead of the ICARRD+20 conference, civil society organisations, social movements, Indigenous Peoples, and pastoralist groups from Africa and the Global South have released a joint statement declaring this moment as one of "deep crisis and urgent possibility."

Twenty years after the first conference, communities continue to face dispossession and land concentration. Customary and collective land systems are being undermined by agribusiness expansion, carbon offset projects, and extractive industries, which are accelerating soil degradation and social inequality.

Pastoralists at a Crossroads
With 2026 designated as the International Year of Rangelands and Pastoralists, the statement highlights that pastoralist communities are among the most severely affected. The expansion of factory farming and industrial livestock production is concentrating land and undermining systems essential to food sovereignty. The statement insists that pastoralism remains one of the most climate-resilient land-use systems and that livestock mobility is essential for maintaining ecological balance in drylands.

Key Demands to Governments:
The statement calls on governments and international institutions to make ICARRD+20 a turning point by committing to:
•Recognise and protect collective and customary land tenure systems.
•Protect pastoralist rangelands and livestock mobility, preventing their conversion to inappropriate uses like monoculture tree plantations.
•Implement genuine agrarian reform and equitable land redistribution.
•End land speculation and financialisation, including carbon credit schemes that dispossess communities.
•Redirect agricultural and climate finance toward agroecology and rangeland restoration.
•Protect land and environmental defenders from violence and criminalisation.
•Establish binding corporate accountability for human rights violations.

The Path Forward
The statement concludes that the future lies in restoring community control over territories and supporting agroecological transitions. "Land justice is climate justice," the statement affirms. "Pastoralist mobility is ecological resilience."

The coalition urges ICARRD+20 to renew global commitments to land justice, led by the communities that sustain the world’s food systems.

Read the full statement below
https://afsafrica.org/icarrd20-joint-civil-society-statement/

#LandJustice #ICARRD20 #PastoralistFutures #Rangelands2026 #Agroecology