24 A fundamental theme in the definition of indigenous peoples is how they relate to the land. All anthropological, ethnographic studies, all documentation which the indigenous peoples themselves have presented in recent years, demonstrate that the relationship between indigenous peoples and the land is an essential tie which provides and maintains the cultural identity of those peoples. One must understand that the land is not a mere instrument of agricultural production, but part of a geographic and social, symbolic and religious space, with which the history and current dynamics of those peoples are linked. Most indigenous peoples in Latin America are peoples whose essence derives from their relationship to the land, whether as farmers, hunters, gatherers, fishermen, etc. The tie to the land is essential for their self-identification. Physical health, mental health, and social health of indigenous peoples is linked to the concept of the land. Traditionally, indigenous communities and peoples of the various countries of Latin America have had a communal concept of the land and of its resources. In lowlands, indigenous peoples have traditionally practiced shifting subsistence agriculture, especially in tropical forests. They often combine this shifting subsistence agriculture with other activities which require an economic space relatively larger than the specifically agricultural plot. The space in which the indigenous population moves, sometimes almost as semi-nomadic groups, is a collective space. The local authorities in each community have their own mechanisms, customs and habits, customary law to distribute egalitarian access among the household communities. According to technology, productivity, ecological sustainability and productive capacity, this rotation can take years, since as a community moves it occupies other spaces before returning to the original place. This happens a lot in the lowland areas, and is very different from the densely settled highlands. Nicaragua’s indigenous communities follow the lowland model. There are two concepts of collective land: the territory, generally, which the community considers common, although internally there are mechanisms to allocate temporary occupation and use by its members and which does not allow alienation to persons who are not members of the community; and the areas which are only used collectively, the “commons” which are not divided into plots. Almost all indigenous communities have a part used collectively as “commons”, and then another part which can be divided and allocated to families or domestic units. Nevertheless, the concept of collective property remains, even if it is disputed by others, often the State itself, when there is no title. When there are problems, the need for property titles arises because the community risks losing everything. The history of Latin America has been one of almost constant dispossession of indigenous communities by external interests. There are pressures for those having usufruct or occupation rights within the communities to obtain a deed title to those plots in one way or another, but when the State recognizes it as private property, it can be sold or rented, and this breaks with the tradition of the community. The history of the practice and of the policies of the States in Latin America, as regards the indigenous peoples, is a protracted and dramatic one. Before conquest and colonization and before the creation of the national States, the indigenous peoples and their lands were a whole, a unique whole. The National State was superimposed on this, and in most countries it takes over property rights to land which in terms of ancestral rights belonged, and still belongs, to the indigenous peoples. In the 19th and 20th centuries, the States declared large geographical