Agricultural Investment Land Acquisition in Times of Emergency in Ethiopia: The Case of Land Delivery to Respond to COVID-19 in Amhara Region

Abstract

The outbreak of the COVID-19 crisis has been affecting the food and agricultural production sector. As part of responding this challenge, the Amhara region has issued a new Directive on the acquisition of land for agricultural investment. However, this measure is criticized for its incompatibility with the regular rural land and investment laws, and its inadequacy to deal with the land use rights of the local people. The purpose of this article was, thus, to examine the content of pandemic induced Directive on agricultural investment land acquisition modality in line with the regular rural land and investment laws, and impacts of the deviation made by the Directive from the regular laws on local land use rights. A doctrinal legal research method is employed to examine the stated purpose. The FDRE Constitution, rural land laws, investment laws, and other relevant legislations are used as primary data sources. A key informant interview has also been conducted with rural land investment experts working at BoLAU of the Amhara Region. Additionally, the existing body of literature in the form of policies, manuals, books, and articles in the area is scrutinized as secondary data sources. The paper argues that the Directive liberalizes existing land acquisition requirements and procedures through promoting irregularity, and recognizes easy and speedy processes of land acquisition for agricultural investment, which contributes to the trouble of local land use rights. Therefore, it is better to develop the agricultural investment land acquisition framework that keeps local land use rights in balance during emergency times. In so doing, the regional government has to provide a rule that empowers local land users and obliges investors to conduct EIA of the project to mitigate the future risk of the investment in agriculture.