A lack of secured ownership rights to farmlands reduces smallholder farmers’ incentives to make long-term investments to rehabilitate old and diseased cocoa farms or engage in sustainable land-use practices such as agroforestry and tree planting.
Ernest Tawiah, from Anyanso, in Konongo District in Ghana, owns seven acres of cocoa farms over three different plots passed down to him by his late father. Since acquiring the land, he has experienced conflict with the farmers who share boundaries with him and even with members of his own family.
“It’s been very disheartening; I couldn’t use my parcel of land located near the Anuru river for any agricultural or economic activity nor expand my farm due to uncertainties about the land ownership.”
Ernest Tawiah – Cocoa Farmer, Ghana
According to Tawiah, farmers like him had no idea how to acquire land documentation and were not even aware of the actual size of their land. Therefore, when the ETG | Beyond Beans and Meridia field teams visited the community in July 2022 and explained the land and tree documentation process under the ASASE project, he was excited and decided to enrol.
The ASASE project seeks to leverage innovative and affordable land rights documentation tools aimed at securing land tenure for smallholder cocoa farmers as well as registration of shade trees as a basis for empowering participating farmers to make long-term investments in their plantations.
In August 2022, Meridia mapped all the farms in Anyanso and began the process of tree counting and taking GPS coordinates, and in June 2023, Tawiah received his FarmSeal documentation.
“The land and tree ownership documents have brought me relief as they confirm my ownership of the land and the trees on it and provide a permanent solution to land disputes,” says Tawiah, “All the boundary conflicts with my neighbours have been resolved and my ownership has been endorsed by the community chief and the chief of the Kokofu Traditional area.”
For smallholder cocoa farmers, land titling is bringing about positive change by providing them with faster and more affordable access to land documentation. This investment in their land security helps to reduce conflicts over land, improves their livelihoods, and secures their land for future generations.