Postwar Resource Tenure Issues in the Settlement of Sudan's Dislocated Population

The number of displaced people in Sudan as a result of conflict and famine over two decades of war has been estimated to be in the millions. The lengthy period of time during which many local populations have been dislocated and the consequent disruption of food-producing activities pose complicated problems in both near-term food security and the longer-term rehabilitation of the country's traditional agricultural sector. Recovery of households and production systems after years of conflict and famine for the displaced will involve more than simply a return to home areas. Resource use and access arrangements will emerge contested and reconfigured as claimants with perceived rights based on various past customary and state tenure regimes seek to exercise these rights in a changed human and biophysical landscape. This article will examine some of the land tenure issues likely to become important as large populations of Sudan's internally displaced seek to reengage in agricultural production systems with which they are familiar. In the more populous agriculturally endowed locations where the recovery of many households and numerous production systems will initially be focused, establishing or reestablishing a mutually agreed-upon tenure system (or set of systems) and modes of resource use and access that are widely seen as equitable, secure, inclusive, and legitimate at the national level will, while complicated, be important to agricultural production and food security.