What Is Happening in the Northern Mozambique Under the Prosavana Programme and Agricultural Growth Corridor: An Implication to the Large Scale Land Acquisition in the Southeast Asia

This paper intends to reveal what is happening in the Northern Mozambique under the ProSAVANA Programme and agricultural Growth Corridor, and draw implications from a field survey for peasant society in Southeast Asia. Large scale land acquisition, so-called “land grabbing”, is extending in Southeast Asia as well as in Africa. Laos and Cambodia are relatively new countries in the sphere of land grabbing. Such countries are expected to promote agricultural growth corridors. Obviously, there is close relations between land grabbing and corridor projects. What impacts will such relations give on the concerned rural communities and peasant farmers?

In Mozambique, some agricultural growth corridor projects have been conducted since the mid of the 2000s. Nacala corridor project in the Northern Mozambique, which connects Nacala Port to Malawi and Zambia, is one of them. In the same area, ProSAVANA programme started in the same area in 2011 under the triangle cooperation among Mozambique, Brazil and Japan. The target area of ProSAVANA covers the Nampula, Zambezia and Niassa provinces.

 The UNAC (Uniao Nacional de Camponeses) and international NGOs are claiming to stop ProSAVANA because of many problems causing from ProSAVANA and its related activities of the local and the central governments, and agribusinesses. This paper highlights the process of land deals, real beneficiaries, and severe impacts on peasants’ communities and examines how large scale land acquisition by foreign investment infringes food sovereignty of the society.