Courses

Karol Boudreaux

Land Tenure and Resource Rights Practice Lead

The Cloudburst Group

Ms. Boudreaux is a lawyer and land tenure and resource rights expert with two decades of experience in the field and as a researcher. Throughout her career she has supported improvements to the land tenure and resource rights of people and communities around the world, with a strong focus on sub-Saharan Africa. Her research concentrates on analyses of property and land tenure systems, natural resource management, and varieties of entrepreneurship. She has conducted field research in ten African countries and have published more than 30 articles and a monograph on property rights, in addition to many opinion editorials. Ms. Boudreaux is lead author of USAID’s Operational Guidelines for Responsible Land-Based Investments, a new tool for private sectors investors in the commercial agriculture sector.

Ms. Boudreaux served as USAID’s Africa Land Tenure Specialist from 2011-2013 and routinely conducted country-level land tenure assessments, provided specific policy guidance on land and natural resource management programing and supported the US Government’s negotiating efforts in developing the Voluntary Guidelines on the Responsible Governance of Tenure of Land, Fisheries and Forests.

Before joining USAID, Karol was an instructor and assistant dean of George Mason University’s School of Law. She serves on the Advisory Council of the ABA’s Business and Human Rights Working Group and as an expert in the Expert Working Group of the Global Land Indicators Initiative of the Global Land Tools Network and UN-Habitat and she served on the Advisory Council of the IFC’s Benchmarking the Business of Agriculture project.

Blog Posts

The real reason young people can’t get jobs in Africa

September 20, 2017
|
Economics

6.8 percent: that was July’s seasonally adjusted unemployment rate for US workers ages 18–44. For those ages 18–24, the rate was 9.5 percent. That’s a high rate for young people. But if you were 20 years old and lived in Africa, you might be thrilled with an unemployment rate like that. Today, 60% of all those unemployed in Africa are youth. In South Africa, more than 55% of young people are unemployed. Those are staggering figures. And many who are working are underemployed: with a job in the informal sector, working only a few hours, or helping on family farms or in family businesses.

Capitalism could save lives with the most boring innovation of all

August 8, 2017
|
Poverty & Inequality

Although it has not received much attention in the US media, millions of people in East Africa are currently facing hunger, acute malnutrition, and perhaps even famine. The situation is especially dire in eastern Ethiopia and Somalia, home to many of the region’s pastoralist communities. Pastoralists rely on livestock to survive, often moving from one location to another to feed and water their stock. But a combination of drought, political instability and poor policies is wreaking havoc. Fortunately, for some herders, insurance products are helping to make a desperate situation a little

This company helps African farmers secure their land rights.

June 29, 2017
|
Uncategorized

In Ghana, a for-profit firm called LandMapp is “unlocking land’s value” by helping to secure farmer’s unofficial land rights. These farmers may have customary or traditional rights to their land, but in many cases these rights are not formally recognized. The company uses GPS-enabled smart phones to map the boundaries of farmers’ plots. They verify boundary information with farmers and their neighbors, and then they provide farmers with documentation, at relatively low cost, of their land holdings. With this verified and accurate information, farmers may be better able to access

African animals need to be owned to survive

June 1, 2017
|
Environmentalism

For years now Africa’s wildlife has been under attack by poachers hunting for elephant ivory, rhino horn, live exotic creatures, and bush meat. But in one country, people have found a market-based solution that seems to work. Poachers and Park Rangers Most wildlife in Africa is the property of the state, which means that responsibility for protecting these increasingly scarce species has largely been left to state agencies that lack the resources and staff they need to monitor and protect animals. In some cases poachers collude with low-paid park rangers or with higher-level government officials."] In

Abusive leaders threaten African progress

May 3, 2017
|
Democracy and Voting

Over the past few weeks, I’ve been reading news stories about the deterioration of democracy in Africa. For someone like me who has been encouraged by positive improvements on the continent over the past decade, it certainly is depressing reading. There are now four African leaders who have been in power for over 35 years."] Reporting on the Mo Ibrahim Foundation’s failure — a second year running — to identify an African leader to receive its sizable good governance prize, Deutsche Welle notes that few African leaders are leaving power voluntarily (a prerequisite for the prize). Instead,