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The last decade has witnessed an exponential interest in land investments across numerous industries in the developed countries. Africa has been particularly targeted for investments, increasingly for biofuel production. Though land investments can boost local economies when realized in an equitable manner, many reports also point to large-scale displacements and loss of land for local landowners. There remain empirical unclarities on the subject, and theoretical and analytical frameworks are underdeveloped in explaining the conditions and factors that determine outcomes.   This thesis is exploring the effects of land investments on land tenure security through the lens of credible commitment and neo-patrimonial theory, with a focus on biofuel production in Tanzania as the chosen qualitative case study. The analysis is based on two specific jatropha investments in Tanzania: Sun Biofuels and Diligent Ltd.   The research contribution of the thesis is in merging two theoretical approaches, CCT and Neo-patrimonialism, and applying it to a new research area of land investments in order to establish an understanding of their effects on local land tenure security.

Il presente lavoro esamina le politiche e gli strumenti giuridici di promozione e di tutela degli investimenti internazionali nel settore agricolo di uno dei principali attori coinvolti nella nuova corsa alla terra: l’Unione europea. Il primo capitolo analizza la competenza dell’Unione a concludere accordi internazionali, al fine di comprendere la portata innovativa dei trattati di libero scambio di nuova generazione dell’Unione. Il secondo e il terzo capitolo individuano delle possibili soluzioni alle due principali esigenze legate agli investimenti in terre agricole, quali la stabilità e la protezione dell’investimento, da una parte, e la tutela delle popolazioni locali, dall’altra, attraverso un’analisi critica della politica commerciale comune e della politica di cooperazione allo sviluppo dell’UE. La tesi intende dimostrare che i trattati di libero scambio negoziati dall’Unione europea e la politica di cooperazione allo sviluppo dell’Unione possono contribuire a promuovere una maggiore certezza giuridica dell’ordinamento dei Paesi in via di sviluppo, punto fondamentale per qualsiasi riforma del settore agricolo, e conseguentemente garantire una maggior protezione non solo per chi investe, ma anche per le popolazioni locali. / The dissertation investigates the policies and the legal instruments for the international investments' promotion and protection in agriculture of one of the main actors involved in the new land rush: the European Union. The first chapter analyses the EU’s competence over the conclusion of international treaties in order to understand the main innovations of the new generation of EU trade agreements. The second and third chapters focus on possible solutions of the two main agricultural lands investments’ requirements: investment protection and certainty, on the one hand, and protection of local populations, on the other, through a critical analysis of the EU common commercial policy and of the EU development cooperation policy. The thesis aims to provide that the EU free trade agreements and the EU development policy may promote a major legal certainty for developing countries, a key point for any agrarian reform, and consequently guarantee more protection not only for investors but also for local populations.

Thesis (Ph.D. (Agricultural Economics)) --University of Limpopo, 2016. / Refer to document