Land Reform in the United Arab Republic

Abstract

T HE land reform program in the United Arab Republic has centered upon limiting the land holdings of the relatively few persons who wielded great economic and political power in the old regimes. But this program, especially as it has developed in the Egyptian region, includes a reorganization of village agriculture along cooperative lines. There are essentially two coordinated programs in the Republic: the one in the Egyptian region has been operative since 1952: the program in the Syrian region is now being initiated. The two programs show the similarities of their kinship, for the more recent effort in the Syrian region is largely an adaptation of parts of the program already in effect in Egyptian territory before the formation of the Republic. It is the purpose of this comment to sketch out some of the principles underlying these programs. The central land reform programs in the Egyptian region are those which were launched in Egypt after the 1952 Revolution: (a) the acquisition of cultivated lands from large holdings for distribution to cultivators; and (b) the rent regulation programs for tenanted lands. Similarly, the central feature of the land reform program in the Syrian region is that of acquiring and distributing to cultivators the excess areas of the