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Syria Land Reform
The dynamism of the agricultural sector caused by the opening
of new farmland in the north and northeast through investments of
wealthy merchants worsened the situation for the poor and often
landless rural population. In 1950 the first Syrian constitution
placed a limit on the size of farmholdings, but the necessary
implementing legislation was not passed until 1958, after the
union of Syria and Egypt.
The 1958 agrarian reform laws were similar to those in Egypt
and not only limited the size of landholdings but also provided
sharecroppers and farm laborers with greater economic and legal
security and a more equitable share of crops. The Agricultural
Relations Law laid down principles to be observed in
administering tenancy leases, protected tenants against arbitrary
eviction, and reduced, under a fixed schedule, the share of crops
taken by landlords. It also authorized agricultural laborers to
organize unions and established commissions to review and fix
minimum wages for agricultural workers.
However, by the time Syria withdrew from the merger with
Egypt in 1961, opposition from large landowners, administrative
difficulties, and severe crop failures during the prolonged 1958-
61 drought had effectively curtailed movement toward land reform.
The conservative regime in power from 1961 until March 1963
blocked implementation of the land-reform program in practice by
enacting a number of amendments to the original law that
substantially raised the ceilings on ownership and opened
loopholes.
Shortly after the Baath Party seized power in March 1963,
Decree Law 88 of 1963 was promulgated, cancelling the actions of
the previous regime and reinstating the original agrarian reform
laws with important modifications. One of the most significant
modifications was lowering the limit on the size of holdings and
providing flexibility in accordance with the productivity of the
land. The new ceilings on landownership were set at between 15
and 55 hectares on irrigated land and 80 and 300 hectares on
rain-fed land, depending on the area and rainfall. Land in excess
of the ceilings was to be expropriated within five years. The
compensation payable to the former owners was fixed at ten times
the average three-year rental value of the expropriated land,
plus interest on the principal at the rate of 1.5 percent for
forty years.
The expropriated land was to be redistributed to tenants,
landless farmers, and farm laborers in holdings of up to a
maximum of eight hectares of irrigated land or thirty to fortyfive hectares of rain-fed land per family. Beneficiaries of the
redistribution program were required to form state-supervised
cooperatives. The 1963 law reduced the price of redistributed
land to the beneficiaries to the equivalent of one-fourth of the
compensation for expropriation. The land recipients paid this
amount in equal installments to their cooperatives over a twentyyear period to finance such cooperative activities as
development, dispensaries, schools, and cultural centers.
By 1975 (the latest available data in early 1987) 1.4 million
hectares (68,000 hectares of irrigated land) had been
expropriated, primarily in the early years of the program.
Distribution moved much more slowly. By 1975, redistributed land
had amounted to 466,000 hectares (61,000 hectares of irrigated
land) and undistributed land to 351,000 hectares. In addition,
there were 254,000 hectares of land that had been allocated to
cooperatives, ministries, and other organizations, and 330,000
hectares that were categorized as excluded and sold land.
Although it was far from clear what the disposition was in the
latter two categories, the statistical data gave the impression
that land reform had not transformed the former numerous farm
sharecroppers and laborers into landowners. This impression was
supported by government data indicating that slightly more than
50,000 family heads (over 300,000 people) had received land under
the reform program. In addition, at various times the government
offered state farmland for sale to the landless on the same terms
as expropriated land, but reported sales were relatively small;
farmers apparently chose to lease the land.
Most observers credited land reform measures with liquidating
concentration of very large estates and weakening political power
of landowners. Some government data of uncertain coverage and
reliability indicated that before land reform more than half of
agricultural holdings consisted of one hundred hectares or more,
but after reform such large holdings amounted to less than 1
percent. The same data showed that smallholdings (seven hectares
or less) had increased from about one-eighth before land reform
to just over one-half of total holdings after reform, and that 42
percent of holdings were between eight and twenty-five hectares.
Other government statistics indicated that holdings of twentyfive hectares or less, representing 30 percent of all land under
cultivation before 1959, represented 93 percent in 1975. A May
1980 Order in Council mandated additional expropriations and
further reduced the size of agricultural holdings. Data from the
1970 census revealed that the average farmholding was about ten
hectares, and that one-fifth of the rural population remained
landless. Despite the Baath Party's commitment to land reform,
the private sector controlled 74 percent of Syria's arable land
in 1984.
Data as of April 1987
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