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MEDIA FOR CHANGE NETWORK

The African Development Bank and the Tree Plantations Industry

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5 years ago

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“Plantations are not forests”, members of communities from Zambezia province, in Mozambique.

In June 2019, the report “Towards Large-Scale Commercial Investment in African Forestry,”
(1) made a call to development-funding agencies, mainly from Europe, and the World Bank,
to provide aid money to a new Fund for financing 100,000 hectares of (new) industrial tree
plantations, to support the potential development of 500,000 hectares, in Eastern and
Southern Africa. This money, according to the report, would be crucial for private investors to
generate profits from the plantations. The new Fund would be headquartered in the tax
haven of Mauritius.
The African Development Bank (AfDB) and WWF Kenya produced this report with funding
from the World Bank’s Climate Investment Funds. The purpose of the report is to assist the
AfDB “in evaluating and designing alternative private funding models for commercial forestry
in Africa with a view to ultimately establishing, or aiding the establishment of, a specialized
investment vehicle for commercial forestry plantations.” The report declares that the
development agencies from Finland, Sweden, Norway, Denmark, Iceland, the United
Kingdom and The Netherlands are interested.
Essentially, the report is a praise to industrial monoculture plantations. It repeats, without
providing any evidence, most of the deceiving arguments that plantations companies use in
their propagandas to cover up the impacts of this devastating industry. The report’s focus is
on outlining the possible financial instruments that would attract companies to this region and
make their investments most profitable.
The report identifies “readily available projects with the potential to establish almost 500,000
ha of new forest (sic) on about 1 million ha of landscape, not including areas that existing
companies and developers are already planning to use for own expansion. It also excludes
early stage or speculative projects.” (italics added) In particular, the report identifies “viable
plantation land” in ten countries: Angola, Republic of Congo, Ghana, Mozambique, Malawi,
South Sudan, Tanzania, Uganda, Zambia and Zimbabwe.

The report further affirms that “Africa may be positioned to have the most profitable
afforestation potential worldwide.” And, then, it goes into explaining the possible investment
schemes that can make profit-oriented business and afforestation objectives (from climate or
voluntary targets) to be aligned and, thus, generate more profits for shareholders.
None of the pages in the report mention, however, not even indirectly, the overwhelming
amount of information that evidences the many negative impacts that industrial plantations
cause to communities and their environments. The report’s authors chose to ignore
plantations companies’ destruction of forests and savannahs; erosion of soils; contamination
and dry-up of water sources; overall violence inflicted on communities which include
restriction of movement, criminalization when resistance emerges, abuse, harassment and
sexual violence in particular to women and girls; destruction of livelihoods and food
sovereignty; destruction of cultural, spiritual and social fabrics within and among
neighbouring communities; few precarious and hazardous jobs; unfulfilled “social” projects or
promises made to communities; destruction of ways of living; rise in HIV/AIDS; and the list
goes on.

In front of this, on September 21, 2020, the International Day of Struggle against
Monoculture Plantations, 121 organisations from 47 countries and 730 members from
different rural communities in Mozambique that are facing industrial tree plantations,
disseminated an open letter to demand the immediate abandonment of any and every
afforestation programme based on large-scale monoculture plantations. (2)
The report, nonetheless, brags about having used a “sector-wide consultation exercise.”
For the authors, the sector includes “industry participants ranging from investors, industrial
players, and Non-Governmental Organizations (NGOs) through to forestry fund managers
(…) To further enrich and triangulate inputs to the study, the team also participated in three
forestry industry events and consulted with a broad range of personal contacts in the sector.”
The report also mentions consultations made to Development Finance Institutions and
agencies as well as oil and other industrial companies. It is clear however how communities
living in or around the almost 500,000 hectares of land identified to be transformed into
industrial monocultures, are not considered part of the sector. Nor were considered the many
communities and groups that have been resisting for decades the plantations in the countries
the report use as examples: Tanzania, Mozambique, Ghana and Brazil. (3)
The report further sustains that the NGO Conservation International confirmed “that it sees
potential in associating large global businesses with the forestry sector.” It further mentions
WWF and The Nature Conservancy – namely, the same category of NGOs mainly concerned
on promoting programs and policies that are aligned with corporate interests as an easy way
to keep their funding, projects and investments.
The purely financial focus of this report, with an eye on how to make most profits, should not
come as a surprise though. It was prepared by a company called Acacia Sustainable
Business Advisors (4), which was set up by Martin Poulsen, a development banker active in
rising private Equity Funds particularly in Africa. Equity Funds try to offer big returns by
spreading investments across companies from different sectors. (5) One co-author of the
report was Mads Asprem, the ex-director of Green Resources, a Norwegian industrial tree
plantation and carbon offsets company. Green Resources’ tree plantations in Mozambique,
Tanzania, and Uganda have resulted in land grabs, evictions, loss of livelihoods and
increased hunger for local communities. (6)

The report also shows the possible responses that investors could have to potential
“barriers”. One “structural barrier” identified is called “stakeholder relations,” a very vague
concept that seems to be related to possible conflicts with communities living in or around
the plantation projects. The term “conflicts” however is not mentioned once in the whole
report. The recommended response to this “barrier” is to “Use AfDB or other MDB
[Multilateral Development Bank] “honest broker” profile to convene stakeholders.” So it
seems that the strategy is to use development banks to make communities believe that the
project has the intention of improving (developing) people’s lives. Another “structural barrier”
identified in the report is “land tenure challenges,” to which the recommended response is to
“Follow FSC and other best practices.” This, of course, is recommended despite the vast
amount of information that shows how, in practice, FSC certifies as “sustainable” industrial
tree plantations that destroy peoples’ livelihoods.
When the climate and development agendas blend for profit
It is relevant to underline how the report makes use of the Sustainable Development Goals
(SDG) and the need for climate change mitigation and adaptation in the African region to
promote the further expansion of industrial plantations. It goes as far as to conclude that
“Channelling financial resources to such efforts [afforestation in the framework of the SDGs]
is within the mandate of international development organizations and special climate funds.”
The report also states that “preliminary interviews yielded information that some oil
companies are already forming alliances with sustainable forestry investment companies.”
This despite the fact that oil and gas companies are a fundamental driver of climate change,
which would undermine any possible positive outcome for the climate. Besides, these
‘alliances’ also give these companies an easy way out of any responsibility for their business
operations. This is clearly exemplified with the announcement of oil giant companies, such as
Italian ENI and Anglo-Dutch Shell, to invest in mega tree plantation projects to supposedly
“compensate” their mega levels of pollution they provoke. These two companies are
responsible for environmental disasters and crimes as a result of their fossil fuel activities in
many places across the globe. (7)
The African Development Bank is complicit in this strategy. While the Bank finances this
report encouraging the expansion of industrial plantations in Africa as a climate solution, it
finances in Mozambique a new gas extraction mega-project in the Cabo Delgado province,
undertaken by a consortium of companies including ENI.
This report is one more proof of how investments from profit-seeking corporations are put in
front of the social well being of people in the name of development and now also of
addressing climate change. There is no “unused” or “degraded” land available at the scale
proposed, which means countless people in Africa will be directly and indirectly affected if
this expansion plan materialise.
Another relevant omission of the report is how it bluntly assumes that the current scarcity of
investment in large-scale tree plantations in this African region is due to the few investment
opportunities available. However, the communities and groups on the ground organizing
almost on a daily basis to oppose the seizing of their lands and lives by these plantations
companies, have clear that their resistance has been successful to halt the expansion of
these plantations in many places. And as the open letter launched on September 21st said,

communities around the world “will certainly resist this new and insane expansion plan
proposed in the AfDB and WWF-Kenya.”

(1) AfDB, CIF, WWF, Acacia Sustainable, Towards large-scale investment in African forestry, 2019,
http://redd-monitor.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/09/towards_largescale_
commercial_investment_in_african_forestry.pdf
(2) Open Letter about investments in monoculture tree plantations in the Global South, especially in
Africa, and in solidarity with communities resisting the occupation of their territories, 2020,
https://wrm.org.uy/wp-content/uploads/2020/10/carta-con-firmas-en-inglés_upd201008.pdf
(3) See more information on resistance struggles against plantations here: https://wrm.org.uy/browseby-
subject/international-movement-building/local-struggles-against-plantations/
(4) Acacia Sustainable Business Advisors, https://www.acaciasba.com/about
(5) Groww, Equity Mutual Funds, https://groww.in/p/equity-funds/
(6) REDD-Monitor, How WWF and the African Development Bank are promoting lang grabs in Africa,
2020, https://redd-monitor.org/2020/09/22/international-day-of-struggle-against-monoculture-treeplantations-
how-wwf-and-the-african-development-bank-are-promoting-land-grabs-in-africa/ ; The
Expansion of Tree Plantations on Peasant Territories in the Nacala Territories: Green Resources in
Mozambique, 2018, https://wrm.org.uy/articles-from-the-wrm-bulletin/recommended/the-expansion-oftree-
plantations-on-peasant-territories-in-the-nacala-corridor-green-resources-in-mozambique/ ; WRM
bulletin, Green Resources Mozambique: More False Promises! 2018, https://wrm.org.uy/articles-fromthe-
wrm-bulletin/section1/green-resources-mozambique-more-false-promises/ ; WRM bulletin, Carbon
Colonialism: Failure of Green Resources’ Carbon Offset Project in Uganda, 2018,
https://wrm.org.uy/articles-from-the-wrm-bulletin/section1/carbon-colonialism-failure-of-greenresources-
carbon-offset-project-in-uganda/ ; WRM bulletin, Tanzania: Community resistance against
monoculture tree plantations, 2018,
https://wrm.org.uy/articles-from-the-wrm-bulletin/section1/tanzania-community-resistance-againstmonoculture-
tree-plantations/ ; and WRM bulletin, The farce of “Smart forestry”: The cases of Green
Resources in Mozambique and Suzano in Brazil, 2015, https://wrm.org.uy/articles-from-the-wrmbulletin/
section1/the-farce-of-smart-forestry-the-cases-of-green-resources-in-mozambique-andsuzano-
in-brazil/
(7) REDD-Monitor, NGOs oppose the oil industry’s Natural Climate Solutions and demand that ENI
and Shell keep fossil fuels in the ground, 2019, https://wrm.org.uy/other-relevant-information/ngosoppose-
the-oil-industrys-natural-climate-solutions-and-demand-that-eni-and-shell-keep-fossil-fuels-in the-
ground /
WRM Bulletin

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Monoculture tree plantations are a false climate solution The enduring legacy of a little-known World Bank project to secure African plantations for European billionaires Witness Radio – Uganda, Community members from Mozambique and other organizations around the world say NO to more industrial tree plantations CSOs to African Development Bank: Don’t fund EACOP Open letter to African Development Bank and Nordic Development Fund: Address reprisals against Paten Clan
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MEDIA FOR CHANGE NETWORK

More than 500 Masindi residents live in fear as a tycoon targets their land.

Published

1 hour ago

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May 6, 2026

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By the Witness Radio team.

Kyamaiso, Masindi District: Katushabe Charles is one of hundreds facing uncertainty after a businessman claimed ownership of land they’ve occupied for decades.

“He has issued threats, arrested some of us, and warned us that he doesn’t want us on this land anymore,” Katushabe, a father of seven and village defense secretary, said, emphasizing the community’s fears of eviction and displacement.

In 2002, Katushabe bought 30 acres of land and took possession with the intention of practicing large-scale agriculture. “I acquired this land from the citizens of Kyamaiso village, and I have lived here for over a period of twenty-four years,” The 50-year-old caretaker of a family of 9 told our journalist.

On his land, he says he grows sugarcane and other crops, such as cassava, which he sells to sustain his family. “I earn some good money from these crops, and I can ably take care of my children, pay their school fees, and look after my family.” He said.

Katushabe is among the 500 families whose survival is at risk after Masindi-based businessman Ahamed Ssewagudde surfaced claiming ownership of their land, on which they have lived for decades.

Witness Radio investigations reveal that the contested land spans 68.79 hectares (170 acres) and covers the villages of Kitinwa, Kyakatera, and Kyamaiso in the Kijunjubwa, Bikozi, and Bwijanga sub-counties.

Residents say some families have occupied the contested land since the 1960s, highlighting their deep roots and long-standing connection to the land.

Sylvia Karungi, a resident of Kyamaiso village, says the alleged land claimant does not have documents to prove ownership, building trust and confidence in the residents’ claims.

“He says he and his family own this land, but this is not true. We have been here for many years. They only have land in another village, Kyangamwoyo, but on this land, they have no proof of ownership,” she said.

Mr. Wobusoboozi Pius, another affected resident, accuses Ssewagudde of using the area police to intimidate and criminalize those opposing the alleged land grabbing.

“He first accused about eight individuals, claiming they had encroached on his land. He relies on police and courts, yet he does not have the rightful documents,” Wobusoboozi told Witness Radio.

However, Ahmed Ssewagudde maintains that his father acquired the land in 1968 and that the current occupants are encroachers who took advantage of his father’s absence.

He says the dispute is not new and has been in court for more than two decades.

“For over a period of twenty-three years, I have been in court with those people, and I have always won the cases, even though they do not want to accept the truth,” Ssewagudde said in an interview with our journalist. Ssewagudde added that evictions will proceed through legal channels.

“We are working on the legal process with my team to get the necessary documents and land title. We shall evict them because no one is above the law. I will only follow the directives of the court.” The tycoon told our journalist.

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MEDIA FOR CHANGE NETWORK

Kiryandongo farmer accuses minister of grabbing 100-acre land

Published

9 hours ago

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May 6, 2026

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Farmer Edward Balikagira at Kinyara II Village in Kigumba Sub-county in Kiryandongo District during an interview with Monitor. PHOTO/DAN WANDERA

A Kiryandongo farmer accuses Minister for Karamoja Affairs Peter Lokeris of illegally occupying his 100-acre plot, sparking a decades-long dispute now under State House scrutiny. Despite interventions, the conflict remains unresolved amid conflicting claims and documentation. Source: https://www.monitor.co.ug/uganda/news/national/kiryandongo-farmer-accuses-minister-of-grabbing-100-acre-land-5447308

Edward Balikagira from Kinyara II Village in Kiryandongo District alleges that Minister Peter Lokeris has forcefully taken over his 100-acre land, which he bought in 1996 from the late John Bitunda Bitagasa.

Balikagira holds a 1996 handwritten sale agreement in Runyoro, detailing payment of Shs170,000, 12 goats, a bicycle, and a blanket, witnessed by local land executives.

Lokeris rejects the accusations, stating he legally obtained the land in 1996 and has occupied it peacefully for over 20 years without issues. He questions Balikagira’s ownership documents.

Balikagira recounts that in 2007, as land committee chair, he negotiated with Lokeris for adjacent land at Shs500,000 per acre, but the deal fell through due to delays.

Tensions peaked in 2022 when Balikagira was arrested for alleged trespassing during the Covid-19 lockdown. A State House fact-finding meeting followed, where Lokeris reportedly admitted to applying for only 100 acres and agreed to return any excess.

A June 2022 State House letter to the Kiryandongo RDC, signed by Nathan Bwogi, halted all activities on the disputed land and noted ongoing fencing by Lokeris’s associates, warning of potential violence.

Despite this, Balikagira says the issue lingers without court action, citing the minister’s influence. Local leaders and the Deputy RDC confirm ongoing administrative reviews but no closure.

Land wrangles like this are rampant in Uganda, especially in Kiryandongo’s former ranch areas, with police reporting a surge in such cases.

Source: Daily Monitor

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MEDIA FOR CHANGE NETWORK

“We are facing increased violent land dispossessions and climate injustices” – African women.

Published

23 hours ago

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May 5, 2026

By

By the Witness Radio Team

 

Stories of displacement, land loss, and resilience filled the room as 45 women from six African countries gathered for the East Africa Women’s Land and Climate Justice Convergence in Nairobi, organized to raise awareness and explore resistance strategies against land dispossession and climate injustice.

 

Representing communities from Kenya, Uganda, Tanzania, the Democratic Republic of Congo, Zimbabwe, and South Africa, the women came together not only to learn but also to speak, listen, heal, and feel the weight of their struggles, resisting destructive extractive projects and reclaiming what belongs to them, despite the immense impacts they have endured.

 

Africa is often described as having vast unused or underutilized land. This narrative has attracted investors, especially from the Global North, into large-scale industrial agriculture and other land-based investments. However, a 2025 report by the Alliance for Food Sovereignty in Africa (AFSA), PLAAS, and the Institute for Agriculture and Trade Policy challenged this claim, showing that such narratives have fueled large-scale land grabs, ecological destruction, and community dispossession across the continent.

 

In Uganda, the land eviction crisis has intensified due to increasing land-based investments that have dispossessed local communities with impunity, with oil development activities among them. According to human rights groups, this has led to more than 100,000 people in Uganda and Tanzania permanently losing their land to make way for the pipeline and related projects.

 

Jenniffer Kiiza, a resident of Hoima, is among those whose land was taken for oil development.

 

“The project has had severe negative impacts, especially on vulnerable groups like women,” she said, highlighting how delayed compensation, gender-based violence, and food insecurity disproportionately affect women and their families.

 

“We face dispossession, and sadly, we are paid very little money, which comes late and is no longer enough to buy land elsewhere. Hunger and malnutrition in adults and babies have increased, and this is affecting us as women and our families.” Kiiza added.

 

Kiiza has continued to speak out despite growing repression against dissent, advocating for justice for her community, especially women, even as opposing such mega-projects comes at a high cost.

 

“These developments have caused hunger, increased gender-based violence, family breakdowns, school dropouts, and early marriages. There has also been a rise in prostitution, as women struggle to provide for their children after losing their land.” She added.

 

Meanwhile, in Uganda alone, the Uganda Police’s Annual Crimes Report, 2025, released early April, recorded 663 cases of land fraud, an indicator of the country’s escalating land crisis.

 

In Zimbabwe’s Midlands province, particularly in Shurugwi, communities are facing similar challenges linked to mining activities, including land dispossession and environmental harm.

Jeyche Belenia, a women’s rights defender from a community affected by Unki Mine, shared her experience during the convergence.

 

“We are facing many challenges from the miners. Chinese investors are coming into our area and evicting us. They tell us to leave, and if we refuse, they come with bulldozers and destroy everything, including our homes. We are left with no shelter and nowhere to go,” she said.

She added that abandoned open pits left by mining companies have become deadly hazards.

 

“When it rains, the pits fill with water. Our livestock fall into them, and even our children have fallen in. We are losing both animals and lives, and the danger is ever-present,” She added.

 

Communities in Zimbabwe also report water pollution from mining activities, which threatens their health and livelihoods. “The water we use is our source of livelihood, serving domestic needs, drinking, and our animals. However, after consuming it, we have experienced illnesses like cholera, and pregnant women face severe complications,” she added.

 

Her revelations echo concerns raised at the 2025 Zimbabwe Alternative Mining Indaba (ZAMI). The 14th edition of the Indaba, convened by the Zimbabwe Environmental Law Organization (ZELO) and partners in September 2025, highlighted multiple challenges within a sector that contributes about 12% to 13.3% of the country’s Gross Domestic Product (GDP).

 

In its December 2025 communiqué, ZAMI noted that unsustainable resource extraction is driving widespread environmental damage, including water pollution, habitat loss, soil degradation, and deforestation.

 

It further pointed to displacement, inadequate compensation, and the absence of Free, Prior, and Informed Consent (FPIC), particularly affecting marginalized communities whose exclusion from governance processes has resulted in violence, disempowerment, and the entrenchment of poverty in resource-rich areas, worsened by weak oversight that has enabled environmental violations and illicit financial flows.

 

Amid these challenges affecting their communities, the women shared, the convergence concluded with a renewed sense of solidarity, forming a network of resilient women committed to defending Africa’s commons—land, forests, water, and cultural systems—now under increasing threat.

 

According to the organizers, the meeting was particularly significant in creating a platform for women to share lived realities that are often excluded from formal land governance discussions. Participants exchanged insights on the challenges they face and identified collective strategies to strengthen their land rights.

 

The convergence brought together women to reflect on their experiences with customary and communal land tenure systems. We will continue to build on this knowledge and strengthen solidarity plans at both national and regional levels with the women,” WoMin’s Sizaltina Cutaia told Witness Radio.

 

Participants described the gathering as a transformative learning space that not only exposed shared struggles but also equipped them with the skills and knowledge to defend their rights collectively.

 

“And a message I can give to a woman in the struggle is to keep fighting for her goal. She should not give up, but continue until she achieves what she wants. This cuts across countries and brings us together through networking. When we unite as women, we realize we share one goal—as mothers in our communities and countries—because land is our motherland,” said Sara Possass from the Kogiya Community.

 

Despite powerful companies taking over their land, women defenders say they are determined to continue resisting and reclaim what is rightfully theirs.

 

“We are fighting back so that we can reclaim our natural resources, including land and water. Many women are facing serious health challenges, including stress and stroke, as a result of these struggles. But we are not going back. We are fighting to reclaim our commons through demonstrations, cultural resistance, and petitions led by marginalized communities.” Jeyche mentioned.

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