As part of the project "Land for the faithful", the LENDEV lab held a workshop to discuss dynamics of expansion of Mennonite colonies in Latin America, with a focus on recent colonies in Argentina and Peru. The lab's Ana Laura Llanes and Yann le Polain, as well as collaborator and former Mennonitische Post editor Kennert Giesbrecht, presented their fieldwork in these new colonies. Ben Nobbs-Thiessen, the Chair of Mennonite Studies at the University of Winnipeg, presented his ongoing work with Mennonite return migrants in Canada, and Hannah Zhao (McGill) told us about her ongoing work analyzing how colonies are connected across distances. Our colleagues Oliver Coomes (McGill) and Christian Abizaid (University of Toronto) provided important insights and reflections, particularly on the Peruvian context. Over two days, we shared insights and charted outlines for what will hopefully be a few different research and non-academic outputs to come in the next year or two. Stay tuned!

On September 9, Olivia successfully defended her PhD thesis, titled "Beyond the deforestation front: Capturing the dynamics of early commodity frontier expansion". Congratulations Dr. del Giorgio! Olivia has been part of the LENDEV lab since 2018, when she started her Master's - we'll miss her dearly but are also excited for her to embark on new academic adventures. Some of Olivia's graduate work is already published: check it out under the Publications tab. You can also follow her next steps on her website or on her LinkedIn page.

In a new paper published in World Development, LENDEV PI Yann le Polain and collaborator Angela Kronenburg García explore the discursive dimensions of agricultural frontiers. In this study, we argue that frontier actors, in response to increasing pressures to be environmentally and socially responsible, deploy narratives that seek to resolve moral tensions around their activities in an attempt both to lessen exposure to criticism and to appease their own moral insecurities. Check it out here to learn more!

Putting land claiming on the map reveals that the footprint of agricultural frontiers extends far into seemingly ‘intact’ forests.

In ‘Revealing land control dynamics in emerging agricultural frontiers', LENDEV lab's Olivia del Giorgio and colleagues develop a novel remote sensing and GIS approach to map and analyze the land claiming activity that takes place before large-scale deforestation for agriculture.

Applying the approach to the Gran Chaco, the authors not only found land claiming concentrated around active deforestation fronts. They show that claims fragment areas that, based on land-use change indicators alone, would be considered largely ‘untouched’ by agricultural activity.

In exposing the spread of land claiming across the Chaco their analysis shows intense land pressure on smallholders there: where land claims were highest, homesteads disappeared most—both in deforested zones and in remote forested areas.

Beyond being an application useful going forward for the Chaco, the methodology can be used to detect land claiming indicators across contexts. It therefore opens opportunities for monitoring the early stages of commodity frontiers across tropical and sub-tropical forests globally.

Find the article here.

In a new article in Journal of Peasant Studies, Yann discusses how Criollo smallholders have been dealing with an upsurge in large-scale land deals in the Paraguayan Chaco over the last few decades. The upshot: they are doing all they can, but in the face of immense power imbalances, that is often still not enough.

Paraguay is experiencing tremendous pressure on land, with rates of conversion to agriculture among the highest in the world. In the Pilcomayo River basin, in the borderlands of Paraguay with Argentina and Bolivia, small-scale Criollo livestock herders are being squeezed out of their traditional livelihoods by outside investors.

Faced with constant pressure on land from outside actors, Criollo smallholders are responding in a variety of ways, including some contestation and resistance but also forms of everyday cooperation, intensification of production, livelihood diversification, and relocation.

These responses are shaping the Chaco landscapes even where the land has not yet been converted to large-scale agriculture by investors. People used to rely on an extensive, forest-based livestock herding system for a living. Today, those who are not driven out of livestock herding altogether are forced to fundamentally change their production systems to adapt to an increasingly scarce land base.

It is late to alter course, as most of the land in the Paraguayan Chaco has already been appropriated and converted by large-scale actors, but securing land tenure for those families that are still on the land but do not have titles and providing legal support to those currently facing investor claims on their land should be the absolute priority for any entity seeking to support the region’s Criollo population.

The LENDEV lab was in Oaxaca, Mexico, for the Global Land Programme's 5th Open Science Meeting, an opportunity to present ongoing work and meet many interesting folks working on land use change around the world! And of course a chance to see the sights and try some local food and Mezcal!