More attention than ever is being paid to this insecurity, yet the issues seem to grow in number and in complexity, blurring hopes for a miracle solution.
Modern traders find ways to use modern law to gain access to the permanent rights of customary law.
Wholesale private appropriation of land is no longer a viable option in ensuring equitable land tenure. In other words, the field is opening up to experimental approaches. Land tenure conflicts are on the rise again, sometimes resulting in violent clashes, as were recently witnessed in eastern Niger, between pastoralists and farmers, or around gum tree orchards in Chad. They are one extreme of the surge of new interest in tenure of land and land resources, and point to the imperfections of existing policies and the dangers of inaction, as much as to the emergence of new groups keen to gain a foothold in the market for land. Some approaches which emphasise full 'ownership' rights have worked well, in an attempt to clarify land rights, and to encourage investment.