Del Campo de Aplicación

In seeking to understand how farmers gain, maintain, and control access to resources in their agricultural practices, I visited a number of farms and had informal conversations and inter- views with their owners. I asked how they acquired the lands they were farming on and how long they had been farming on them. I asked the farmers to explain how plots of land were distributed amongst themselves at different sites and the reasons for any distributional dis- crepancies. I also observed and participated in farm activities including irrigating vegetables and building ridges. In one of the discussions with the farmers, I learned that multiple actors had claimed ownership of lands close to the city center that were used for vegetable cultiva- tion. This led me to conduct an extensive case study in line with Mitchell (2006) and Gluckman (1940) to ascertain why and to also gain a better understanding of how land is accessed, used, and managed.

The first case study involved three open space vegetable sites in Central Tamale. These sites include the Gumbihini old dam, the Gumbihini new dam, and the Gumbihini wa- terworks areas or former VRA. These are among the biggest vegetable sites in the area and multiple actors are in competition for control over them. Traditional leaders were in charge of these lands since under state law land no longer in use falls automatically under the control of the chiefs. However, other actors including the Ghana Water Company limited (GWCL) and Volta River Authority (an electricity company now referred to as Northern Electricity Distribu- tion Company (NEDCo)) also claim to have rights to at least parts of the same lands - rights which they claim to have acquired through compulsory land acquisition exercises initiated to provide vital public services to the people.

To build up my cases, I conducted in-depth interviews and focus group discussions on different themes like resource access, management practices, and technology adoption at the various vegetable sites. I also carried out participatory photography to get a ‘thick’ description of farmer’s management practices and their strategies to maintain their livelihood. I used in- terview guides to clarify and triangulate information already collected. I also visited with the traditional authorities to learn about the history of land use and ownership in the region. I asked local chiefs how land is acquired and what the different procedures are and compared their responses with the information I obtained from officials at the various public land agencies.

Land dispute case files were studied with subsequent interviews held with the registrar of the high court and the commercial court clerk. I corresponded with lawyers for the different

parties to the dispute including government institutions like the Land Commission, Ghana Wa- ter Company, and the Volta River Authority to get a clearer picture of how the judiciary system functioned alongside customary laws in land dispute cases. I also had several key informant interviews with non-governmental organizations, staffs of the metropolitan assembly, as well as the regional and local agricultural officers. For informal conversations, I visited with the farmers at their homes as a sign of friendship and solidarity with their needs. I participated in funerals and naming ceremonies. I also welcomed many farmers at my place of stay who often brought with them vegetables from their farms for me to use. Before our meetings I offer them the customary soft drink offered to visitors as a sign of welcome in the Dagomba tradition. This practice of hospitality and reciprocity created a bond of friendship which eased data collection. I was no longer looked at as a foreigner but I was referred to as a sister. This opened up avenues of trust and more in-depth information. For example, during a conversation with a farmer, he said “I am talking to you because you understand our culture and can help us; you are not like the “white” researchers who do not have respect for our culture or our agricultural extension workers who do not help us”.

3.4.3.6 Meeting places as political arenas

I attended a number of meetings including a farmer’s union meeting organised by the Urban Agricultural Network in 2014, a stakeholders meeting organised by the Resource Centre on Urban Agriculture and Food Security on urban agriculture in 2015. I also attended a metropol- itan assembly meeting on the importance vegetable farming in 2015 combined with a technical meeting on integrating fish farming as a component of urban agriculture in the proposed Gum- bihini new dam in 2015. I also collected minutes of land disputes from the national archives in Tamale and had a discussion with a colleague about other stakeholder meetings which I did not attend.

Land disputes meetings are of particular interest to this thesis because they are local arenas where ‘talking claims’ are made Land disputes could be between two people or groups of individuals and between the former and the latter and an institution as explained in the extended case study on Gumbihini in chapter 7. Meetings are forums for conflict mediation and where wrongdoers are punished. Meeting settings are also occasions for political tussles, power struggles, and government in action. They are places where hybrid governing systems are combined for the resolution of issues critical to individuals and society. During stakeholder meetings, different claims to resource were expressed and solutions to have access to landed property proposed. Different access routes to resources for vegetable farming were suggested by the participants and options for a legalised solutions discussed.

These stakeholder meetings are arenas where the authorities of different politico-legal institutions are acknowledged and their recognition of claims are sought by individuals or

groups. The meetings open up possibilities for forum shopping and institutional shopping as explained by Benda-Beckmann (1981) and Bierschenk and Olivier de Sardan (2003) and il- lustrated in chapters 6 and 7. I also attended the vegetable farmers’ union meetings organised by a non-governmental organisation that is very active in aiding farmers to secure resources for vegetable production. As a partner working with farmers to secure lands and gain access to water and seeds, it has acquired legitimacy from the public as an organization worthy of funding. In-depth and key informants’ interviews were carried out to delve deeper into the meanings attached to the socio-political processes that take place in these arenas and how struggles for power and authority at these meetings affect farmers` access and control over resources for vegetable cultivation.

My meetings with the municipal assembly and technical team about the creation of a new reservoir to promote urban agriculture was largely about development. Specifically, about developmendiscourses that were introduced by transnational actors such as the Italian Coop- erative as described in Ferguson and Gupta (2002), which inspired grassroots self-help move- ments that played important roles in providing social services to members and the community. By getting involved with this project, the state also re-establishes its role as the social bene- factor of the people. The next section explains how spatial data was collected and how it added value to the qualitative data in this study.