The role of tenure documents for livelihood resilience in Trinidad and Tobago

Abstract In this paper, we use the concept of documentality to explore the role of documentation of land tenure in the livelihood resilience of farmers in Trinidad and Tobago. We studied small-scale farmers whose livelihoods occur on lands held under different tenure arrangements. We found that it is not the access to land but the formal documentation of access to land that enables livelihood resilience. Not having tenure documentation excludes farmers from loans and state incentives for agriculture. This weakens the buffer capacity of the affected farmers, which is a contributor to livelihood resilience.