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INVESTMENTS IN IRRIGABLE LAND FOR LARGE‐SCALE
AGRICULTURAL PRODUCTION IN MALI.
Conference paper
Africa for Sale : analysing and Theorizing foreign Land Claims and Acquisitions”, 28 & 29
October, 2010. Groningen University, Netherlands.
Adamczewski Amandine 1, Perrine Burnod 2, Hermine Papazian 3, Yacouba Coulibaly 4, Jean‐Yves Jamin 1, Jean‐
Philippe Tonneau 2,
1 Cirad / UMR G Eau (Montpellier, France)
2 Cirad / UMR Tetis (Montpellier, France)
3 INP‐ENSAT – Cirad UMR Tetis (Toulouse, France)
4 Nyeta Conseil (Niono, Mali)
INTRODUCTION
As revealed by the mass media, announcements of large scale land acquisition by private investors have
drastically increased, especially in Africa, that appears to be the new and privileged target of land‐grabbing
(Cotula et al., 2009; Von Braun & Meinzen‐Dick, 2009; World Bank, 2010). These acquisitions favor countries
which are not self‐sufficient in food consumption. They put back on the stage food and land security matters,
and more widely agricultural development issues.
In Sub‐Saharan Africa, Mali is a country perceived as rich in land and water resources. As such, many foreign
States and private companies are engaged in various investment projects in this country (Cotula et al., 2009;
GTZ, 2010), especially in the Office du Niger (ON) area. Irrigated schemes currently cover around 100 000 ha,
but the superficies which could potentially be developed for irrigation might exceed two millions ha. The ON
area enjoyed a substantial economic success during the past 20 years, thanks to small holders who provide the
main part of the national rice consumption (Bonneval et al, 2002) ; it is therefore considered as the heart of
Malian agricultural development policies. Investors looking for irrigable land to develop large‐scale farms
represent a great opportunity for a State trying to finance the extension of the irrigated area and to revitalize
its agricultural sector. Yet, benefits from those investments prove to be less obvious for small holders, whose
land rights are not secured, neither in the irrigated schemes (where the available area per family is decreasing
due to population growth) nor on rainfed areas (used for agriculture, breeding and forest activity) targeted by
private and foreign investors.
Are these new investments complementary or competitive for family agriculture? Beyond the debates that
often oppose the promoters of these two types of agriculture, this papers aims at enlightening this question by
studying the supervision plan set up by the State. What are the formal or informal tools used for investments
incentive and land regulation? And what kind of agricultural models do they favor?
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In the first place, this paper describes the diversity of the projects planned in the ON area and their state of
progress. In the second place, it analyzes the crucial role played by the government in promoting investments
and building partnerships with foreign operators. The next part analyzes the government actions in land use
regulation. Finally, we tackle the issue of how social responses at local level, may allow to defend some
population rights.
All in all, the discussion addresses investors ‘impact on family agriculture in the ON area. Facing the current
land issues, how do the actors react?
To conclude, we discuss on how the State, through the establishment of appropriate rules, could favor private
investments in the area while preserving the family agriculture in place since the colonial era.
METHODOLOGY
Aiming at building upon the previous studies conducted in Mali (Burnod et al., 2009; Cotula et al. 2009; GTZ,
2010), this work is based on a field survey. Local medias are currently the main source of information on land
acquisition projects. But they struggle to obtain relevant data because of the sensitive political issues linked to
national and foreign investments, whose scope and number are often ill known. Our study rely on a series of
200 interviews held in Bamako and in the ON area with members of government, ministry agents, foreign and
national investors, local elected representatives, NGOs, population and local farmer associations, and farmers
trade‐unions. In addition, we read and analyzed available written documents: juridical laws, political
orientations, project documents.
Numerous checkouts have been done on the field in order to evaluate the efficiency of the different projects
realizations. Information, especially regarding quantitative aspects, was very difficult to obtain; data often vary
according to the different sources. Therefore, data in this paper should be considered as basis for analyzing and
discussing land issues in the ON area, and not as reflecting any official source.
WHICH INVESTMENTS ARE PROJECTED IN THE ON AREA?
According to the SDDZON , the surface area which can be potentially developed for irrigation in the region is
supposed to reach two and a half millions ha (map 1) , but only 98 000 ha are currently developed, that is to
say less than 5% of the potential. These lands are the private property of the government and their
management is under the responsibility of Office du Niger, a public institution (Ordinance 96‐188/P of 11 July
1996). Since 2005 the government is promoting the establishment of new operators, having sufficient financial
resources to develop irrigation infrastructures and to settle large scale “modern” farms.
Over the period 2004‐2009 (with an increase since 2007), operators have required leases for more than
870 000 ha, almost 10 times the superficies of currently developed schemes.
DEMANDS FOR 870 000 HA: 45% BY NATIONAL INVESTORS, 55% BY FOREIGN INVESTISTORS
National Investor requests, which have been little analyzed in the previous studies on the land‐grabbing
phenomenon in Mali, concern almost half of the coveted superficies in the ON area (Annex 1).
Nearly 90% of the 840 lease requests registered at the ON level are initiated by Malian citizens. But, 80% of the
requests concern limited areas (1 to 50 ha), and one third less than 5ha. Individual or farmers association wish
to extend their farms or to settle in ON area to grow rice and market gardening products.
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Only 3% of these national investors wish to obtain leases on larger superficies, i.e. 500 to 100 000 ha (Annex 1).
But these requests concern over 300 000 ha, i.e. 80% of the surface coveted by national investors. Promoters
are private firms already acting in Mali (SNF, Tomota) or private investors newly arrived in this field and on
which there are very few data. Most of them proclaim their wish to develop oil crops for food or agrofuel
markets (e.g. Jatropha curcas). Many investors do not have any specific agricultural project: they claim they will
choose their crops according to market opportunities. If needed (market changes, financial restraints), they
might consider to switch from new production systems based on oil crops, to rice and market gardening based
production systems, as used by ON peasants; they could cultivate their land themselves or sublease to farmers;
subleasing is officially forbidden, but implicitly tolerated by the ON.
Two types of national investors must be distinguished. The first ones are small urban farmers or investors
wishing to delegate the agriculture production by copying the peasant farming system based on rice and
market gardening (the main production pattern in the ON area); the second ones are investors owning more
financial resources but having often no experience in the agricultural sector, who wish to develop new patterns
based on other crops than rice, with more mechanization and use of employees.
Foreign investment projects are very few: 18. Some of them are already widely introduced by medias. They
cover superficies from 2500 to 100 000 ha, for a total of nearly 470 000 ha. The origin and the nature of the
promoters are diverse. 8 projects are initiated by foreign private firms which consider the land as a mean to
respond to the current energy and food issues. Based on the little information that is available, these projects
seem to be oriented toward oil crops, for agrofuel or food markets. Four other projects are directly undertaken
by foreign states (sovereign wealth funds) or by government‐owned corporations. They aim at producing food
crops in order to guarantee their own food consumption. Most of these projects foresee developing large scale
plantations, based on salaried staff. Two projects are initiated by inter‐state organizations (Cen‐Sad and
Uemoa) which plan to redistribute the developed land to small investors or to small/family farmers. Built as a
response to the requests made by Malian government, these projects aim at producing rice for national and
sub‐regional markets. Another project is undertaken by an international donor (MCC – United States). It aims at
attributing 5 to 50ha land plots to existing and new farmers in order to develop intensive rice production. The
plots come from a total surface of 16 000 ha of potentially irrigable lands, that MCC obtained from the Malian
government. Lastly, an American NGO would have also required 100 000 ha to set up an irrigation project in
the ON zone.
MAIN CROPS AIMED BY INVESTORS: RICE AND OIL CROPS
FIGURE 1: CROPS PLANNEDBY NATIONAL AND FOREIGN INVESTORS (SURFACE %)
Source: project documents and surveys, 2010
49%
3%
34%
4%
7% 3% Riz
blé
Oléagineux
Jatropha
canne à sucre
Non précisé
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Projects related to oil crops (sunflower, soy bean, peanut: 290 000 ha; Jatropha: 35 000 ha) are mainly located
in areas that are not yet developed like Kareri, Kokeri, and east‐Kouroumari; it generally concerns large
superficies, exceeding 2500 ha. Rice projects, small and large, represent a total surface of 415 000 ha and are
rather located next to existing schemes (close to M’Bewani, Macina and Kouroumari areas). Sugar cane
projects (60 000 ha) are concentrated next to the existing plantations, in the M’Bewani area, where sugar cane
is cropped since 1960.
Localizations have a direct effect on the sums to be invested: as the establishment zone of the project is getting
away from the main existing irrigation infrastructure, the access becomes more and more difficult (absence of
road), and the cost of the construction becomes higher (from 5000 to 7000 €/ha). These costs have often been
underestimated by the investors, which is partly why there is very slow progress observed in the development
of the schemes.
MORE THAN 94% OF THE REQUIRED SUPERFICIES ARE ALLOCATED ON TEMPORARY
AGREEMENTS, AND ONLY 2% HAVE BEEN DEVELOPED.
Most of the lease requests are far from being finalized and accepted. If more than 870 000 ha are concerned by
allocation procedures, only 50 000 ha have led to a lease delivered by the Office of Niger, and only 2 leases
have been given to foreign investors. It means that 820 000 ha are only attributed on a temporary basis (Figure
6). Figures vary widely depending on sources, so they should be used carefully. There is a large flexibility
observed in the procedures. Irrigation infrastructures have to be built during the first three years following the
provisional agreement letter signature. Yet, some requests for projects that started five years ago (signature of
the provisional agreement letter) are still valid, although no construction were made. Without this flexibility,
90% of the provisional agreement should be cancelled.
Moreover, 30% of these provisional attribution (among 224 000 ha) should be cancelled because the
promoters did not provide the technical and socio‐economical studies requested within the year following the
initial approval. As for the most important projects, two thirds of the 11 Malian projects and a third of the 18
foreign projects have still not started the preliminary studies that are normally required; therefore, these
projects should be cancelled. Among all projects undertaken by foreign investors, only two have led to a lease,
but did not start any construction; two other projects have completed the impact studies and started the
construction works, but without waiting for the preliminary signature of the official lease.
FIGURE 2: STATUS OF DIFFERENT LAND ATTRIBUTIONS IN THE ON AREA
Source : ON may, 2010
Leases
Provisional attribution given by
the Malian State
Provisionnal attribution given by
ON
Attributions subject of a
cancellation procedure
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Among the 870,000 ha requested for attribution or lease, very little development was carried out. Among the
50,000 ha given in leases (from 1998), only 11,000 ha are cropped. 7,000 ha are cropped for sugar cane by the
sugar company historically installed in the area. For the other 4,000 ha, they are cropped by small farmers
hired as contractual employees by a private company. The effective development of these ”private lands” is
based on the work of family farmers. Frequently, when a scheme is developed, investors or farmers who are
not able to crop their lands let or sub‐let them to get some return from their investment.
Among the 820,000 ha provisionally allottedto big projects, only 2 promoters (MCA‐Mali, PSM) really started
irrigated crops, on roughly 2,000 hectares (less than 3% of the total attributed area).
The most important work implemented to develop irrigation was carried out by Malibya project, which
completed mid 2010 the construction of a new canal intended to irrigate 100,000 ha (fourth big canal of this
type built since ON creation). But this very big canal is currently not used, as no scheme was developed
downstream. 30 ha of an experimental farm are cropped, but are located in an ON scheme, to test rice
cultivation as practiced by the small farmers. It is far from the objectives of the project which are to grow rice
under sprinkler irrigation and to practice intensive breeding with housing.
THE IMPORTANT ROLE OF THE GOVERNMENT IN INVESTMENTS PROMOTION
THE ENGAGEMENT OF AN INCITING POLICY FOR THE INVESTMENT
In some newspapers, the countries of the South are often presented as victims of the current dynamic of
investment in agriculture, seen as a form of neocolonialism. Governments play a key function in the promotion
and the hosting of investors (Cotula et al, 2009). And so, during the last years, the Malian government had a
strongly inciting policy to favor the development of the investments and, in particular, direct foreign
investments.
In spite of strong agricultural potentialities, the Malian agriculture which accounts for 37% of the GDP and
employs nearly 75% of the population (Samake et al., 2007), is characterized by a low productivity. This is partly
linked with the low level of the investments, corollary of the generalized poverty. In the ON area, the rhythm of
State and international donors investment is no more sufficient to ensure the development of schemes; for
example, the cost for developing additional 50,000 ha is estimated at 240 billion FCFA (366 million €) by
Hydropacte (2010). As public funds appear to be unable to take up the challenge agriculture development the
objective of the government is not only to invite investors to finance irrigation infrastructures, but also to
manage great intensive farms; it thus shows its loss of confidence in and its lack of interest for family
agriculture. Favoring the installation of private or foreign investors became a priority within the framework of
this new agricultural policy.
This inciting policy was concretized by the creation, in 2005, of the agency for the investment (API), a one‐stop
service set up to facilitate and promote foreign investment. It was formalized within the framework of the
Economic and Social Development Project (PDES). The PDES underlines explicitly that the government must
“identify, promote and support private projects able to create new production units”, in particular in the agro‐
industrial sector. In PDES plan, the ON area is presented as “one of the largest development poles of Mali”. In
2008, with the implementation of the master plan for the ON zone (SDDZON), the government launched
various calls to private and public investors with the objective of developing 120,000 ha by 2020 (www.office‐
du‐niger.org.ml). Knowing that only 100,000 ha were developed during the past 80 years, achieving this goal
imposes an intensive investment and work rate. Therefore,, a strong policy of partnership was setup to support
the investment policy.
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STATE PROPERTY LAND IS MANAGED BY THE O