Land ownership values and rural structural change in Cyprus: Fid-Bau Portal

Land ownership values and rural structural change in Cyprus

King, Russell / Burton, Steve

Abstract Land ownership and land tenure are key elements in the agrarian landscape. Land tenure and farming behaviour are seen as critically determined by the motives and attitudes of the people involved, in particular their attitudes towards land ownership. Particularly in the Mediterranean region, these values are intimately linked to social relations and social organisation. Cyprus is an especially relevant case study for research into land ownership values because of its ongoing programme of agrarian reform which encourages farmers to exchange fragmented land parcels in order to achieve a more consolidated spatial arrangement of holdings. Using point-score analysis as the basic measuring technique for land ownership values, five villages are sampled from a range of agro-economic zones in Cyprus. For a total of 200 respondents, attitudes to land ownership and farming are explored and related to socio-personal variables and to attitudes towards the economic and social impact of the land consolidation policy. Marked differences in land ownership values and in post-consolidation behaviour are found to exist between highland and lowland villages: upland villages have predominantly social and expressive values and the more positive post-consolidation changes; in lowland villages instrumental or economic values are dominant, yet post-consolidation changes are less marked.