Refugee reintegration in rural areas
Subtitle: land distribution in Ban Pha Thao, Lao PDR
By: Brett M. Ballard
Contributors: Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Center for International Studies; Inter-University Committee on Internal Migration
Series: Rosemarie Rogers working paper series -- working paper #18
Publisher: Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Center for International Studies
Published: 2003
Place of publication: Cambridge, Mass
Language: eng
Number of pages: 26
Subjects: Return migration; Emigration and immigration
Description: The successful reintegration of refugee groups in rural areas often depends on people's access to and control over productive land resources. The acquisition of land and the preservation of secure use rights depend on people's ability to invest household labour and capital resources to intensify agricultural production. For the Hmong of Ban Pha Thao in Laos, people with social and political capital, as well as financial assets, were able to acquire and invest in better quality land following the introduction of an irrigation scheme. The unequal distribution of land has resulted in a rapid re-articulation of the village social structure, in which some people in the community have been able to re-integrate more successfully than others. Policy makers and planners must ask themselves if such outcomes are desirable in terms of how they envision "successful reintegration."
Notes: "March 2003."

"The Inter-University Committee on Internal Migration"--Cover.

Includes bibliographical references (p. 25-26).

Working paper available in HTML and PDF on the Inter-University Committee on International Migration webpage.

Supported by a grant from the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation for the MIT Program on Non-Governmental Organizations and Forced Migration.