Afghanistan 2002
06/06/2002

Landless people in rural areas are in a particularly vulnerable situation. In the past, many landless families worked as laborers for farmers with large plots of land and lived on their land. According to a woman who had recently returned to Shaidan, near Bamyan, “This tent is where I used to live, but this is not my land. We were farmers but we worked for a man with lots of land and he let us live here. He has not returned, and when he does return, we may not be able to work for him. We want to be farmers again, but only people with land are receiving seed.” In some cases, landless people come to urban centers and live as displaced persons. As one landless man explained, “I want [International Organization of Migration] to move me to another place, but there is no place that I can go.” Agencies have yet to develop a clear policy on how best to provide reintegration assistance to landless families. Currently, the largest component of reintegration assistance is shelter, but landless families, unless they negotiate land use rights with landowners, will be unable to build shelters. There is discussion among agencies about developing alternate reintegration programs for landless families.