Responsible Land Governance for a Just Energy Transition

Just transition considerations manifest differently across scales. For example, at the international level, distributional debates may focus on who pays, who benefits, and how costs are shared between states. At the national level, particularly in Emerging Markets and Developing Economies, just transition discussions frequently emphasize how to leverage transition-linked investments, such as in transition minerals, to advance macro-level development objectives. At the local level, the focus shifts to how transition-linked projects affect land use, livelihoods, and tenure security, including whether affected communities are meaningfully consulted.

Reconciling these perspectives is critical when applying lessons across contexts and designing land governance interventions.

The global energy transition is highly land-intensive, generating new and competing demands locally, from land-based economies through the expansion of transition mineral extraction, renewable energy, biofuels and biomass, and associated infrastructure. The transition therefore cannot be understood solely as an industrial, technological or financial shift; it is also a reorganization of how land is allocated, controlled, and used.

This report explores how national energy transition plans can better embed responsible land governance practices, by synthesizing applied lessons from civil society action and policy engagement in Indonesia and Zambia.

Enabling Just Outcomes

For the purposes of this report, whether energy transitions are just can be understood through three interrelated elements:

1. Distributional outcomes: How the costs, benefits, and risks associated with transition-linked investments are distributed across different groups or territories;
2. Process of decision-making: How decisions are made, by whom, and on what terms, ensuring full inclusion and participation of all community members at relevant stages of policy and investment decision-making;
3. Navigating historical and structural impacts: How legacy land-use patterns, structural inequalities, and historical impacts shape present-day transition pathways and outcomes.

This report offers governments, subnational authorities, and civil society organizations a set of practical, evidence-based strategies for doing so — grounded in years of applied engagement in Indonesia and Zambia, and relevant to the broader range of countries navigating the governance demands of the energy transition.

Embedding Land Governance

This report identifies four elements of land governance that are particularly consequential for just transition outcomes — and where practical strategies exist to strengthen planning and implementation.

1. Tenure security: Where legitimate tenure rights, whether formally recognized or socially accepted, are unclear or insecure, communities face heightened risks of displacement, exclusion from decision-making, and unequal benefit-sharing. Participatory mapping can ensure that efforts to secure tenure are responsive and reflect all local land uses, especially when coupled with national-level reforms to recognize all legitimate tenure rights in inclusive and contextually appropriate ways.
2. Spatial planning: Spatial planning is an important tool for managing competing land uses to minimize adverse impacts and maximize benefits of the energy transition for land and land users. Strategic engagement with plan revisions, and strengthening the capabilities of subnational governments to gather and use spatial data can improve the quality and legitimacy of outcomes.
3. Responsible approaches to scaling investment: Governments increasingly rely on policy reforms, investment promotion, and legal frameworks to scale transition-linked investments. While such approaches can mobilize capital, they also risk prioritizing speed and certainty over social and environmental safeguards.
4. Coordination and subnational leadership: Effective coordination across ministries and levels of government, alongside empowered subnational leadership and civil society, is essential to align national transition objectives with local realities, manage trade-offs transparently, and strengthen accountability in implementation.

This resource was produced in collaboration with the International Institute for Environment and Development (IIED) as part of ALIGN, funded by UK Aid from the UK government.

Authors

Hansika Agrawal

Legal Researcher

Esther Akwii

Senior Legal Researcher

RM

Rose Mosi

AS

Amaelle Seigneret

Themes

• Community Benefits
• Development Planning
• Energy Transition
• Land Governance

Regions

• South and East Asia
• Sub-Saharan Africa

Tags

• Climate change
• Consultation & consent
• Energy systems
• Fossil fuel phaseout
• Human rights