Sustainable Agricultural Development: Roots of Peacebuilding

“In environmental peacebuilding there’s an approach called the ‘contact hypothesis’, which says that putting conflicting parties together to talk about environmental issues or agricultural practices typically reduces prejudice, enabling them to have a neutral space for dialogue and to create a lasting trust.”

A 2023 publication co-authored by Alliance researchers highlights the close relationship between land use and peace. Analyzing post-conflict areas, researchers found that sustainable land-use systems (SLUS) can deliver four additional benefits: 1. socio-economic stability through the creation of new jobs, 2. social cohesion through the participatory design of land use between different social groups, 3. increased cooperation through shared natural resource governance, and 4. development of platforms that unite previously-divided parties through a common objective. This article will explore this connection between sustainable land use systems, agricultural development and peace in three regions: post-conflict areas of Colombia, socio-politically unstable regions in the Horn of Africa and conflictive agricultural lands in the Democratic Republic of Congo, where existing challenges are aggravated by climate variability.