Title: Competition for irrigated land: inequitable land management in the Office du Niger (Mali)

Authors: Amandine Adamczewski; Thomas Hertzog; Jean-Yves Jamin; Jean-Philippe Tonneau

Addresses: Ed 60 Montpellier III – UMR G-Eau CIRAD Montpellier, TA C 90/15, 73 rue jean-françois Breton, 34398 Montpellier Cedex 5, France ' Agroparitech Abies, UMR G-Eau CIRAD Montpellier, TA C 90/15, 73 rue Jean-François Breton, 34398 Montpellier Cedex 5, France ' UMR G-Eau CIRAD Montpellier, TA C 90/15, 73 rue jean-françois Breton, 34398 Montpellier Cedex 5, France ' UMR Territories, Environment, Remote Sensing and Spatial Information, Bureau 105 TA C-91/MTD – Maison de la Télédétection, 500 rue Jean-François Breton – 34398 Montpellier Cedex 5, France

Abstract: Like other African countries, Mali is affected by the phenomenon of foreign investments and land grabbing. In the irrigated area of the Office du Niger (ON), the government provisionally allocated nearly 600,000 ha to public and private, foreign and domestic, investors. Given the lack of public regulation of these investments, different actors are trying to get privileged access conditions to irrigated land. This article tries to examine land management in the ON irrigation scheme in Mali. This will enable us to analyse its repercussions in terms of inequalities of development, and to determine its linkages with the state governance. This article presents the different land management systems (both formal and informal) and analyses the inequalities they entail. Based on case studies, it shows how the actors' strategies enable them to circumvent the rules and to guarantee their development.

Keywords: Mali; Office du Niger; irrigated areas; agricultural development; land management; access to land; farmers; investors; inequity; irrigation; agriculture; public regulation.

DOI: 10.1504/IJSD.2015.070237

International Journal of Sustainable Development, 2015 Vol.18 No.3, pp.161 - 179

Received: 18 May 2013
Accepted: 02 Nov 2013
Published online: 01 Jul 2015 *

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