Redistribution of land in post-communist Romania

A geographer discusses changes in the ownership of state and collectivized rural land in post-communist Romania. In an analysis based on historical and recent ownership data as well as on the author's interviews with 205 landholders from East and West Romania, local officials, as well as politicians, the study examines how the country's rural land has been redistributed after 1989. The combination of restitution and distribution is singled out as the unique feature of the Romanian land reform that sets it apart from the less equitable procedures adopted by other post-communist countries. Similarly different, as noted in the paper, is the high share of Romania's agricultural sector in the country's labor force.