Customary Land Tenure in Liberia - Land Tenure and Property ...

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men‟s focus on life tree cultivation has restricted their time available for seasonal farming. In Tengia and Motor
Road Clans, women reported that young men (and sometimes women, too) are increasingly leaving the clans for
schooling and jobs in urban centers. Male labor shortages in certain clans, coupled with the large number of war
widows, has spurred some women to begin to engage in activities previously reserved for men, such as brushing,
felling trees, and burning farms. This is particularly the case for women who are widowed and whose sons have
either left the clan or who are too young for heavy work.
3.3.6 Climactic Variability
Clan members in all clans except Dobli and Motor Road reported experiencing climatic variability, including
variable rainfall patterns. Climatic variability can
negatively impact farmers, making it difficult to know “Before, we knew the dry season, but now we do
when to brush and burn their fields prior to planting. not know when the rain can come.”
– Chief in Saykleken Clan
3.4 ANALYSIS
This section provides a brief analysis of the current and potential impacts of changing land uses and livelihoods
in conjunction with population growth and climatic variability. In many of the studied clans, population growth
has led to increased demands on land for agriculture and other natural resource uses. Increased demand for land
has led to both reduced availability of land suitable for farming and reduced fallow periods, as farmers seeking
land must increasingly utilize “young bush.”
Declining availability of suitable agricultural land and reduced fallow periods can also be attributed to the
increase of permanent cropping, particularly of cash crops such as rubber trees, cocoa, and palm. These trees are
“life trees” and, thus, land planted in them is removed from the cycle of seasonal cropping. A shift from seasonal
agriculture to permanent cash cropping was evident in Gbanshay Clan, where many of the clan members that we
spoke to had or were seeking to plant rubber on their land. In this clan and others, extensive planting of rubber
is ushering in a more individualized tenure system, potentially overriding the traditional system, which is
dominated by seasonal rights. (See further discussion of this in Chapter 4). While youth in Gbanshay expressed
optimism about the prospects of increasing rubber cultivation for the earning of cash income, older members
lamented the impacts on seasonal farming and feared that its gradual abandonment could lead to periods of food
shortage (presumably if rubber prices were to decline or for families who lacked rubber farms).
Also, women‟s roles in household livelihood strategies are changing in conjunction with shifting livelihoods. As
cash cropping and alternative livelihoods increase, women may be confronted with growing male labor shortages
and must thus either take on traditionally “male” tasks and/or shift to alternative livelihoods. This was evident in
Mana Clan, where women reported that male labor shortages necessitated them to shift from rice farming to
mining and service provision.
Finally, climate variability has the potential to both increase the divide between relatively wealthy and relatively
poor farmers and to incent households to diversify their livelihood strategies beyond farming. With variation in
the seasons, those farmers with sufficient funds may be able to buy labor to clear their land earlier in the season,
while those dependent on kuu for clearing would have to wait their turn. If the rainy season arrives early, those
households at the end of the kuu rotation may not be able to clear and burn their fields before the rainy season
begins. In such cases, these households would not be able to plant rice and vegetables on time. Additionally,
households that are negatively affected by climatic variability may be drawn to other livelihood activities that are
not so dependent on the seasons, such as mining, pit sawing, and rubber tapping. The actual effects of these
shifts on food security are difficult to predict since much will depend on the stability of markets for minerals,
timber, and rubber. On the one hand, these alternative livelihoods promise higher incomes. However,
substitution away from subsistence food cropping toward increased reliance on markets does introduce greater
risks to the stability of that income and ability for rural populations to smooth their consumption.
CUSTOMARY LAND TENURE IN LIBERIA