Where is commercial agriculture

Skip to main content. Commercial Agriculture. Featured Resources. Agriculture and Agribusiness program leader. Pesticide Safety Education Program. New Resource for Hemp Growers. Farm and Ranch Stress Assistance Center. Resource Collections Commercial Agriculture is a broad and diverse area of study. Manure Share. Crop Sciences Research and Education Center. Corn Disease Incidence Maps. Additional Crops Resources P esticide Safety Education Program : Fact sheets, newsletters and training information about pesticide safety.

Soybean Rust Tracker : County-level map of the U. Pests and Diseases. University of Illinois Plant Clinic. Home of the free - because of the brave. Well, now you can! Registration is free. Faculty Speaking Events. Featured Resources. Click to view the whole newsletter. Recent Resources. Common goals of sustainable farming :. One of the biggest problems that commercial farmers face is water conservation.

Traditionally, crops have been watered using agriculture sprinklers that distribute water across a wide area of land. A significant portion of the water is unused by the crops due to evaporation. Water problems also arise for livestock producers, especially those who experience drought and live in consistently warm environments.

Because water is an essential component of survival for their animals, it becomes increasingly important for farmers to practice water management and conservation tactics. Sustainability in commercial farming addresses the ability of agriculture to maintain a rate of production that can support the growing demand for food.

One commercial farmer also complained about distance and cost of accessing courts and legal representation. Of the individuals Human Rights Watch interviewed, all had complaints about how commercial farming was jeopardizing rights, but none believed court was a realistic option for them. Instead, residents often seek help from traditional authorities, such as headmen and chiefs, even though the farm block land is no longer considered customary land, and is instead under the authority of the state.

Most residents interviewed by Human Rights Watch had complained to with their village headman. Headmen are traditional authorities of lower rank than the chief, and who are well respected and usually within walking distance.

Some of these headmen are also facing eviction by commercial farmers. As for senior chiefs, they have substantial authority in the eyes of rural residents, and some residents may seek their help. Chiefs might assert pressure on commercial farmers or government officials, or be a source of alternative land for displaced people, but they have no direct authority over commercial farms.

In some cases, the chiefs themselves may stand to gain from the arrival of commercial farming operations, and as noted above, they may play a role in displacement of residents. In Serenje, the role of traditional authorities in agreeing to land conversion and allocation of alternative land for displaced residents is murky, and complicated by the fact that the chief who appears to have agreed to conversion of customary land for farm blocks died.

His successor, who was appointed in , would not give residents facing displacement from commercial farms new land until an audit of customary land in his chiefdom had been done. The meeting was about buying land from the chief. They even took us to see the land, which is a forest. District officials should be another option for residents seeking redress. Residents told Human Rights Watch that they had reported complaints to the District Commissioner who represents the Office of the President in the district , but they received very little help.

Some communities that had problems with commercial farmers had formed delegations that invested time and money to visit the district offices in the Boma to report grievances to the District Commissioner, Council Secretary who heads the District Council , and other government officials. But residents said they received little or no help from government offices. Most of the commercial farms in Serenje district are family-run and have no established policies or procedures to deal with complaints from residents who are impacted by their operations.

Residents do not feel that they have any viable way to communicate grievances to the farmers. The only exception is Silverlands, which established a Stakeholder Committee in , with representation from the company, government officials, residents and a civil society organization. Zambia has laws and policies intended to regulate environmental and social impact assessments, land transfers and consultations with affected people, and resettlement and compensation.

But some of these laws and policies have serious gaps, others are badly implemented, and coordination between government agencies is abysmal. Key public institutions have broadly failed to oversee and regulate firms and individuals investing in commercial agriculture in Serenje district, leading to human rights abuses.

Human Rights Watch interviewed officials from relevant government agencies, and without fail, officials from one would point fingers at another for failing to protect local communities. Virtually all acknowledged problems with regulation and the existence of abuses, but did not take any responsibility for preventing or addressing them. The Environmental Management Act and its regulations set out requirements for environmental impact assessments and mitigation plans.

Under the EIA regulations, agricultural projects with land clearance of 50 hectares or more are required to submit an EIA. Unfortunately, the EIA process, under law and in practice, is flawed. First there is no formal registration or certification system for environmental consultants, which poses the risk that consultants preparing EIAs will lack expertise.

Second, the government is not systematically tracking the failure of companies to submit EIAs. Of the six farms investigated by Human Rights Watch, according to ZEMA officials only one Silverlands farm had submitted an EIA concerning land clearance and cultivation, though all of them were cultivating or planned to cultivate more than 50 hectares. Third, ZEMA appears to have limited capacity even to ascertain whether a particular project has an EIA on file with it, let alone monitor for compliance with its terms.

Zambian law requires government permission prior to undertaking certain commercial farming activities. The permission may take the form of licenses, certificates, approved plans, or other authorizations. For example, the Environmental Management Act requires licenses for the use of pesticides and toxic substance, emitting pollutants or contaminants, and managing waste and discharging effluents.

Some officials acknowledged that there is an enforcement gap. There is a need for legal instruments because now we just wait for the goodwill of the investor. It is generally difficult to verify whether such authorizations have been granted in the context of any one project. Human Rights Watch sought confirmation of environmental, land, and resettlement authorizations for the six farms it investigated, but regulatory officials said they could not confirm their existence for each of these farms.

With or without the required authorizations, commercial farmers in Serenje have started farming, and have displaced long-term residents. Three Sawyers, Matthews, and Billis of the six farms Human Rights Watch investigated appeared to be clearing land as of , installing irrigation systems, and farming well above 50 hectares of land without all the government permits required.

Although the government is championing farm blocks, including through the Farm Block Development Program, it is telling the public very little about agriculture initiatives. Public information on the boundaries, sizes, and uses of land in agricultural blocks is limited. Even government officials said they relied on a kind of patchy and informal institutional memory to understand how Luombwa farm block was created, the boundaries, and other information.

For the more recently created Nansanga farm block, more information is available, but even that is not complete or easily accessible to the public. Even when government registries exist, public information may be inaccessible. Human Rights Watch sent multiple information requests to government registries, and most did not respond. Zambia does not have a law on freedom of or access to information, but a bill on this issue has been pending since Under Zambian laws and regulations, several agencies should play a coordinating role when it comes to commercial agriculture and its impacts on local communities, including the Department of Resettlement and Zambia Development Agency.

They have not done so effectively. The Department of Resettlement, within the Office of the Vice President, is supposed to coordinate agencies when there are voluntary or involuntary resettlements, including of people displaced due to investments. The National Resettlement Policy outlines its responsibilities, as well as those of investors and other government agencies. Its board is supposed to review environmental impacts as it considers applications.

Yet in interviews with Human Rights Watch, officials across the board appeared confused about their responsibilities, often claiming some other agency or level of government was responsible.

For example, national, provincial, and district officials had conflicting views on which agencies should regulate commercial farms and farm blocks. A central government official in the Ministry of Agriculture and Livestock said that the provincial governments are in charge of farm blocks outside the Farm Block Development Program, and that district councils are charged with creating new farming areas.

It would only be at headquarters. They should have it. If not, then it is a shame that headquarters would behave that way. Nonetheless, in Serenje district, commercial farming is vaulting ahead with little government oversight, and agencies that should coordinate have only sporadic contact with commercial farmers and residents, if at all. Many government agencies interviewed by Human Rights Watch complained about other agencies failing to coordinate. One ZEMA official said that the Ministry of Lands does not inform them about land title applications even for land that will be used for large-scale commercial farming, which entails environmental and social impacts.

A number of Zambian laws and policies, including the Lands Act, decentralize authority, giving substantial powers to district councils. These councils play an important role in land transactions.

They are supposed to verify whether land is vacant before a conversion from customary to state land, and if not vacant, ensure that settlements and persons with interest in the land in question have not been affected by the conversion. In the case of the six commercial farms Human Rights Watch investigated in Serenje, the District Council performed these functions in only the most superficial ways, if at all, and none of the residents mentioned any contact with the technical committee.

For some of the six farms, it appears that the Serenje District Council recommended that the Commissioner of Lands approve issuance of land title certificates without flagging that there were families living and farming on the land, and without first requiring the commercial farmers to submit resettlement action plans. The Serenje District Council was aware that there were residents living on the land alienated to commercial farms, though some of their documents ignore this or appear to undercount the residents.

But another district document from October reported that there were no settlements at all on the hectare farm. It appears that Council authorities may also have undercounted the residents on the land offered to commercial farmer Matthew Rowe.

Philip Jackman, who had initially been allocated the farm now known as Rowe farm farm no. The populations may have changed over time, but these discrepancies suggest that district authorities are not thoroughly validating the number of residents that may be impacted by commercial farming.

The Ministry of Lands uses remote sensing with satellite imagery to verify settlement patterns before approving land acquisitions. Some central and provincial government officials told Human Rights Watch that they suspect that district officials are misrepresenting the situation on the ground. If they are not genuine enough to indicate that there are people on the land, the Ministry of Lands will pass title.

But some of them cannot be trusted. All commercial farmers interviewed by Human Rights Watch said they had very little guidance from government bodies on how to proceed if there are residents on their leased land. We would have done one had we known about it. Nobody seems to know what they [commercial farmers] are supposed to do. We are walking around in square circles.

Some commercial farmers said they had written letters and organized meetings with government officials and community members, but they have a lot of uncertainties and questions unanswered. Do they all get to be treated the same [during resettlement]? Several commercial farmers singled out agencies that should be key sources of information for commercial farmers. ZDA is a big one. There is no clear-cut procedure in place on how resettlement needs to be done.

We get different advice from different people and need to decide on whose to follow. This report describes how some commercial farming ventures in Serenje district have forcibly evicted families from their homes. Under international law, the Zambian government is obliged not only to refrain from carrying out forced evictions, but to prevent private actors from doing so as well.

It has woefully failed to live up to that responsibility. More broadly, the Zambian government has a duty to effectively regulate commercial farms and other business ventures to ensure that they respect human rights in their operations. Instead, key government agencies have been almost entirely absent from the scene, with the practical effect of leaving commercial farmers to their own devices in deciding how to deal with the communities they find living on the farm plots they leased.

Not only has the government failed to enforce laws and regulations meant to ensure that farms assess and mitigate the likely social and environmental impacts of their operations, but it appears not even to be taking basic steps to monitor whether commercial farming ventures are complying with the law.

The human rights impact of these displacements has, for many people, been devastating. Families have been displaced from their homes and into levels of insecurity and poverty many had never experienced before. Even in situations that may not amount to forced evictions, the Zambian state has often left families on their own to negotiate relocation packages with farmers who have acquired or applied for title to the land they live on.

In these deeply uneven negotiations, many families lose their livelihoods along with much of what they own and receive only pa"ltr"y and inadequate compensation. As this report describes, the compensation many receive has been nowhere near adequate to the task of fully replacing everything that is taken from them when they are made to move, let alone starting a new life somewhere else.

For their part, the commercial farmers who are directly responsible for displacing many families out of their homes have a responsibility to respect the human rights of people living on the farm plots they take title to. Even in the absence of effective government oversight, these farmers should take effective steps to identify and mitigate the negative human rights impacts of their operations.

They should make sure that displaced families are adequately compensated, and that compensation packages are developed in close consultation with the people concerned. Instead, in the cases we documented, some commercial farmers were taking advantage of the regulatory vacuum they encounter on the ground to push people aside without regard for their basic human rights.

International law protects rights related to land and security of tenure, including the rights to housing and property. Importantly, neither international nor regional human rights protections on housing or property hinge on individuals holding formal title to land or property. It notes in its General Comment No. Notwithstanding the type of tenure, all persons should possess a degree of security of tenure which guarantees legal protection against forced eviction, harassment and other threats.

Everyone should have the right, and a meaningful opportunity, to challenge the legality of an eviction. International law prohibits forced evictions, considering them gross violations of human rights. This report describes forced evictions carried out by commercial farmers. The Zambian government has a responsibility not only to refrain from carrying out forced evictions, but to prevent private parties including commercial farmers from doing so.

It may well be true that some families have moved onto farm plots in Serenje district only recently, and are so lacking in any bona fide claim to a right to reside there that farmers are within their rights to seek an eviction.

In those cases, it is imperative that the government take steps to ensure that people in question have a meaningful opportunity to contest their removal. Participation in a court case can, for many rural families, be a bewildering and prohibitively expensive undertaking, and they should have access to free legal aid services. Zambia is required to guarantee the rights to an adequate standard of living including the rights to food and water , to health, and to education.

The forced evictions and threatened displacement in Serenje district jeopardized all of these rights for long-term rural residents. International and regional human rights law guarantees the right to available, accessible, and adequate food. The meager food aid some families received a couple of bags of maize over two years was sporadic and insufficient.

International and regional human rights law also protects the right to water. International and regional law also recognize the right to health. Residents also have a right to access information relevant to their rights to food, water, health, and a healthy environment.

This includes information on pollution of their water sources by commercial farming, other environmental and health risks, and how this may affect their health. International human rights law does not impose obligations on private businesses, but it does recognize that they have human rights responsibilities that they should live up to even when governments fail in their duty to mandate this.

The United Nations Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights [] provide that businesses have a responsibility to exercise due diligence to identify their impact on human rights, avoid causing or contributing to human rights abuses through their operations, avoid complicity in abuses, and ensure that any abuses are remedied. Some commercial farmers in Zambia are also subject to standards required by financial institutions involved with their investments, for example through loans.

Among the commercial farms covered by this report, only Silverlands was subject to such standards. Commercial farmers should be aware of the requirements of relevant financial institutions or intermediaries. Central, provincial, and district government officials should provide immediate relief and take longer-term measures to remedy the harm suffered by rural residents of Serenje who were forcibly evicted from their homes or were displaced without adequate compensation.

They should develop these remedies in consultation with local residents, ensuring meaningful participation by women and girls. They should:. The Department of Resettlement, the Ministry of Lands and Natural Resources, the Ministry of Agriculture and Livestock, the Zambia Environmental Management Agency, and the Zambia Development Agency should enforce existing laws and policies relevant to commercial farming and protection of rural communities.

The Ministry of Justice and Ministry of Lands should take steps to better ensure access to judicial and non-judicial complaint mechanisms and access to remedies for people impacted by commercial farming ventures, and increase scrutiny of land transfer recommendations.

Support capacity of the government at district, provincial, and central levels to manage commercial agriculture and provide protection to rural communities, including by:. Samer Muscati, consultant, shot photos and video to accompany this report. Chris Albin-Lackey, senior legal adviser, and Babatunde Olugboji, deputy program director provided legal and program reviews.

Josh Lyons, satellite imagery analyst, produced satellite images for the report. Mable Banda, consultant, provided translation and research assistance. Help us continue to fight human rights abuses. Please give now to support our work. Human Rights Watch. Donate Now. Click to expand Image. Soybean field on a commercial farm in Central province, Zambia. Several rural communities in Serenje district have been forced off land they have always lived on and farmed to make way for commercial farming.

They said before displacement, water was readily accessible. These shallow wells dry up in the drier months, so the residents end up walking to distant streams. Kasenga and her 10 children had to sleep in the open for several months. Teachers here said they were worried that the school would shut down because of expanding commercial farming in the area, despite assurances from government officials and commercial farm operators that the school would not be shut.

Although many residents of Kalengo section have these permits allowing them to use the land from the traditional authority, these are not recognized by government bodies and commercial farmers. Silverlands: A Better Example of Corporate Responsibility The Silverlands farm has handled consultations and compensation better than the other five farms investigated by Human Rights Watch.

Human Rights Obligations and Responsibilities This report describes how some commercial farming ventures in Serenje district have forcibly evicted families from their homes.

Legal remedies or procedures should be provided to those who are affected by eviction orders. States parties shall also see to it that all the individuals concerned have a right to adequate compensation for any property, both personal and real, which is affected. In cases where eviction is considered to be justified, it should be carried out in strict compliance with the relevant provisions of international human rights law and in accordance with general principles of reasonableness and proportionality.

The Committee considers that the procedural protections which should be applied in relation to forced evictions include: a an opportunity for genuine consultation with those affected; b adequate and reasonable notice for all affected persons prior to the scheduled date of eviction; c information on the proposed evictions, and, where applicable, on the alternative purpose for which the land or housing is to be used, to be made available in reasonable time to all those affected; d especially where groups of people are involved, government officials or their representatives to be present during an eviction; e all persons carrying out the eviction to be properly identified; f evictions not to take place in particularly bad weather or at night unless the affected persons consent otherwise; g provision of legal remedies; and h provision, where possible, of legal aid to persons who are in need of it to seek redress from the courts.

Evictions should not result in individuals being rendered homeless or vulnerable to the violation of other human rights. Where those affected are unable to provide for themselves, the State party must take all appropriate measures, to the maximum of its available resources, to ensure that adequate alternative housing, resettlement or access to productive land, as the case may be, is available.

Rights to Food, Water, Health and Education Zambia is required to guarantee the rights to an adequate standard of living including the rights to food and water , to health, and to education.

They should: Take any necessary steps to ensure that displaced people have near-term access to adequate housing, food and water, as well as access to basic services including primary and secondary school and health services. Ensure that victims of forced evictions have meaningful access to legal remedies.