Box 1 (continued)
social sustainability, but addresses issues concerning product quality management. The implementation of the ISO 55001 standard intends to reduce GHG
emissions, energy costs and other related environmental impacts, through
systematic management of energy (ISO 2011). However, similar to the
above ISO standards, it does not contain any specific requirements on land
use and land-use change.
4.3 Methodology
4.3.1 Establishing the Extent of Italian LSLAs in SSA
In order to identify foreign-led LSLAs in SSA, we use the Land Matrix Global
Dataset (henceforth Land Matrix). The Land Matrix is an online public database that
reports global land transactions,
3 which entail a transfer of rights to use, control or
own land through sale, lease or concession. This implies the conversion of land from
local land uses to large-scale commercial uses. The acquisitions reported in the Land
Matrix are 200 ha or larger, and were concluded after the year 2000 (Anseeuw et al.
2013). The Land Matrix records cases of intended and realised land deals, involving
foreign or domestic investors, and it reports the status of investments at different
levels of implementation (i.e. under negotiation, start-up phase, in operation, failed).
For the purpose of this chapter, we extract directly from the Land Matrix data on
the contract size of the different Italian land investments in SSA. When the contract
size areas are not available, we extract production size data. Areas reported as
‘intended size’ are used only when neither contract nor production sizes are available. To investigate the possible competition between food and energy production,
we also identify the final uses of the acquired land. Data are classified according to
various levels of reliability and are crosschecked to the extent possible. We use basic
descriptive statistics for data analysis. A more detailed explanation of the methodology used in this chapter can be found in Antonelli et al. (2015).
We should also mention that the Land Matrix has faced substantial criticism
among scholars and practitioners. According to Pearce (2013), databases of land
transactions might both over- and under-estimate the levels of land transactions. For
example, the size of land acquisitions could be under-estimated, as conflict-ridden or
fragile countries might provide incomplete information (Nolte et al. 2016; Anseeuw
et al. 2013). Furthermore, many of the reported land transactions might not have
materialised, or reached the operational stage, or even used less land than actually
acquired (Verhoeven and Woertz 2012; Locke and Henley 2013). Due to these
inherent limitations of large-scale global inventories on land deals, this study does
3 For more information refer to: https://landmatrix.org/en/
146
M. Antonelli et al.
social sustainability, but addresses issues concerning product quality management. The implementation of the ISO 55001 standard intends to reduce GHG
emissions, energy costs and other related environmental impacts, through
systematic management of energy (ISO 2011). However, similar to the
above ISO standards, it does not contain any specific requirements on land
use and land-use change.
4.3 Methodology
4.3.1 Establishing the Extent of Italian LSLAs in SSA
In order to identify foreign-led LSLAs in SSA, we use the Land Matrix Global
Dataset (henceforth Land Matrix). The Land Matrix is an online public database that
reports global land transactions,
3 which entail a transfer of rights to use, control or
own land through sale, lease or concession. This implies the conversion of land from
local land uses to large-scale commercial uses. The acquisitions reported in the Land
Matrix are 200 ha or larger, and were concluded after the year 2000 (Anseeuw et al.
2013). The Land Matrix records cases of intended and realised land deals, involving
foreign or domestic investors, and it reports the status of investments at different
levels of implementation (i.e. under negotiation, start-up phase, in operation, failed).
For the purpose of this chapter, we extract directly from the Land Matrix data on
the contract size of the different Italian land investments in SSA. When the contract
size areas are not available, we extract production size data. Areas reported as
‘intended size’ are used only when neither contract nor production sizes are available. To investigate the possible competition between food and energy production,
we also identify the final uses of the acquired land. Data are classified according to
various levels of reliability and are crosschecked to the extent possible. We use basic
descriptive statistics for data analysis. A more detailed explanation of the methodology used in this chapter can be found in Antonelli et al. (2015).
We should also mention that the Land Matrix has faced substantial criticism
among scholars and practitioners. According to Pearce (2013), databases of land
transactions might both over- and under-estimate the levels of land transactions. For
example, the size of land acquisitions could be under-estimated, as conflict-ridden or
fragile countries might provide incomplete information (Nolte et al. 2016; Anseeuw
et al. 2013). Furthermore, many of the reported land transactions might not have
materialised, or reached the operational stage, or even used less land than actually
acquired (Verhoeven and Woertz 2012; Locke and Henley 2013). Due to these
inherent limitations of large-scale global inventories on land deals, this study does
3 For more information refer to: https://landmatrix.org/en/
146
M. Antonelli et al.