In Nicaragua, structural adjustment policies under the new government have led to sharply reduced agricultural producer credit and tighter conditions for its use. Along with conflicts over property rights that emerged from the Sandinista era land confiscations, the effect has been to speed a process of parceling and land sales among the population of agrarian reform beneficiaries which was the main recipient of redistributed lands. Faced with imperfect capital markets and tenure uncertainty, small-scale producers have resorted to distress sales of their parcels that could lead to a restratification of land ownership patterns.