Global Protection Forum 2023: Housing, Land and Property Rights as Proactive Protection: Custom, Climate and Community

This session looked at how supporting Housing, Land and Property rights in customary settings can be part of proactive and preventative approaches that reduce harm and mitigate protection risks related to safe, secure and dignified shelter and housing, and access to land for food, agriculture and livelihoods. The session brought together actors and activists from operations, policy and donor perspectives, including development, peace and ecological actors.

There is a particular focus on exploring the value and significance of customary HLP actors in the allocation and management of housing, land and properties for the protection of ecosystems and indigenous communities as part of this. Climate change increasingly results in the displacement of local communities. Local communities living in customary settings have an increasingly important role to play in the mitigation of climate risks for the proactive protection of people and livelihoods.

Further efforts are needed to integrate HLP into thinking on prevention and proactive protection, and to do so in collaboration with nexus and solutions-oriented actors. A couple of positive examples will illustrate how to address this gap.

Intended outcomes include a greater understanding and connection across clusters, sectors, operations and perspectives. This fits into a wider workstream within the HLP AoR following requests from operational colleagues for more resources on working in customary HLP contexts, which can lead to hybrid and evolving frameworks on HLP.

Watch the session recordings using the link on the right-hand side of this page.