Land commodification in the Southern Ye Township, Mon State, Myanmar

Abstract

Myanmar's political transition in 2011 has been praised by the international community, and it has encouraged the inflow of investment. A number of laws and policies were reformed, including the Farmland Act, the VFV Law, and the Investment Law. Yet this reform has impacted land in rural areas. The research study presented here critically examines a stone mining project planned in Magyi village tract in southern Ye Township in Mon State in 2019 which involved the company purchasing agricultural land and village land. This research examines how the ceasefire agreement with New Mon State Party (NMSP) instigated land dynamics in the southern area of Ye Township, the process of land commodification by a stone mining project in Magyi village, and how communities mobilize and de-commodify land to protect their rights. This case study is conceptualized by the working of commodification by Karl Polanyi and the processes of variegated capitalism. This study uses a qualitative approach by conducting online and phone interviews with a case study of a stone mining project in Magyi village tract. Secondary data was also collected from various sources from conducting literature review. The key findings show that the mining project that the mining project had detrimental impacts on the community in different ways, such as tension among fellow villagers, the loss of their permanent agriculture job, and forced village relocation. In addition, land formalization processes underway and the bilateral ceasefire and national peace process made land more easily accessible to wealthy outsiders, resulting in villagers fearing land appropriations. Villagers’ coping mechanism to these pressures included wage labor, becoming migrant workers in Thailand, or migrating to other areas. Communities resistance emerged to de-commodify their land and protect their communities. They claimed customary rights as a way to de-commodify land, learning from other communities on how to mobilize rights to their customary land and management practices.