La complessa cartografia dei fenomeni liquidi: la geografia del land grabbing

The complex and problematic spatial diffusion of the liquid land grabbing phenomenon offers the AA not only the opportunity to indicate the scientific itinerary with which it is possible to overcome the difficulty of knowing the places from which they originate and those in which the process of land grabbing takes place, but also the opportunity to reflect on the epistemological function of cartography. The article explains why the thematic representations are useful, as well as visually revealing the distribution of the phenomena examined, also to push the investigations towards the interpretation of their most hidden meanings. Behind most of the land acquisition negotiations lie mixed relationships involving economic and from state financial groups; businesses and companies, driven by declining interests in financial growth rather than sustainable economic development. The Authors, after careful analysis and critical elaboration, have geo-referenced, incomplete and contrasting quantitative data of the phenomenon. The cartographic representations that have arisen have outlined the complex and kaleidoscopic world of land grabbing that on a global scale not only outlines the obvious directions of colonialist North-South, but also those of new generation South-South, North-North and South- North. The old and new trajectories confirm that the phenomenon of land grabbing has become globalized by now involving, with different roles and functions, most of the countries of the world and designing a new geography, where the boundaries between predated and predatory countries are less strict and more flowing and where the demarcation line, which at one time could have corresponded geographically to that of the equator, has failed as some prey countries are also predators. The emergence of these new flows makes it necessary to clarify some of the contradictory indications of international agricultural policies, in particular those hypocritically concerned with producing biofuels by extending no food cultivations and are barely attentive to the speculative appetites for land grabbing that take vital resources from the rural populations forcing them to leave their lands and emigrate.