Abstract
Abstract. In large parts of sub Saharan Africa it remains an ongoing challenging to map millions of unrecognized land rights. Existing approaches for recognizing these rights have proven inappropriate in many cases. A new generation of tools needs to be developed to support faster, cheaper, easier, and more responsible land rights mapping. This is the main goal of its4land, an European Commission Horizon 2020 project that aims to develop innovative tools inspired by the continuum of land rights, fit-for-purpose land administration, and cadastral intelligence. its4land is using strategic collaboration between the EU and East Africa to deliver innovative, scalable, and transferrable ICT solutions. The innovation process incorporates a broad range of stakeholders and emergent geospatial technologies, including smart sketchmaps, UAVs, automated feature extraction, as well as geocloud services. The aim is to combine innovative technologies, capture the specific needs, market opportunities and readiness of end-users in the domain of land tenure information recording in Eastern Africa. The project consists of a four year work plan, € 3.9M funding, and eight consortium partners collaborating with stakeholders from six case study locations in Ethiopia, Kenya, and Rwanda. The major tasks include tool development, prototyping, and demonstration for local, national, regional, and international interest groups. The case locations cover different land uses such as: urban, peri-urban, rural smallholder, and (former) pastoralist. This paper describes the project’s activities within the first 18 months and covers barriers discovered, lessons learned and results achieved.
Highlights
The results of many existing ICT-based approaches focused on land tenure recording in sub Saharan Africa are deviating from experts expectations
Some developed tools such as those derived by the Global Land Tool Network (GLTN), have successfully combined conventional land administration design and project implementation
Data is being collected using a series of stakeholder group-based workshops employing the Nominal Group Technique (NGT)
Summary
The results of many existing ICT-based approaches focused on land tenure recording in sub Saharan Africa are deviating from experts expectations. Challenges include, amongst others, incomplete recordation, and unresolved and/or escalated disputes that exacerbate, small and large-scale investments Such situations can be observed in various developing regions, with sub Saharan Africa being one example (Zevenbergen et al, 2013). There is a clear need for innovations to face the challenge of mapping in a fast and cheap manner, the 70% of unrecognized land rights. Some developed tools such as those derived by the Global Land Tool Network (GLTN), have successfully combined conventional land administration design and project implementation. The work in Kenya (Kisumu and Kajiado) is focused on adapting tools to enable mapping of pastoralist land rights and layered disputes. In Ethiopia (Bahir Dar and Amhara Region), the interest is in developing approaches that improve plot recordation of urban smallholder and dwellers
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