Good Land Governance Research Articles

One Map Policy: Digital Administration Methods as an Effort to Solve Land Overlaps in Indonesia

Only now has Indonesia's land use problem been partially found to be a bright spot. Moreover, the government created the map that gave rise to this issue. Therefore, holding the One Map Policy in government policies is necessary to realize good land governance. This research aims to determine how effective the One Map Policy is in solving land problems and realizing good spatial governance to provide welfare to the people. This research is written using normative juridical methods, using literature studies that examine a problem from a legal point of view and look for data in reading materials. So, the One Map Policy is one of the alternatives and essential policies to resolve overlapping land uses in the community. The government has made a One Map Policy to give each institution or ministry a synchronization information map theme. So that there is overlap in land use, there is No cause of conflict between interests and loss to society. Making the One Map Policy is vital because of the benefits of designing a room with Scale, quickly resolving conflict, overlapping overlap, using land, and speeding up regional development programs and infrastructure implementation.

The practical norms of land governance in Senegalese communes. Institutional incompleteness, politicisation, semi-formality and bricolage

The decentralisation of land administration is often presented as a condition for 'good land governance'. In Senegal, the 1964 law on the national domain places rural land within the national domain, under the responsibility of the communes. They can allocate use rights to residents, provided that they personally cultivate the plot. All land transactions are prohibited. These principles, which stem from the 'African socialism' of independence, are in conflict with the political stakes of land tenure, the development of commercial transactions and agribusiness, and intense land speculation, particularly on the fringes of the Dakar metropolis.Based on in-depth surveys conducted in six communes on the outskirts of Dakar (the capital) and Saint-Louis, this article reveals the administrative practices and routines, often far removed from the rule, that constitute communal land governance in action. Favoured by lasting legal loopholes, a set of semi-legal or even illegal practices have become widespread, through successive bricolage, on the part of elected officials and communal administrations as well as by the land administration. To varying degrees depending on the socio-economic and political contexts of the communes, they allow access to land for actors from outside the commune, and the legalisation of illegal sales, while at the same time favouring the clientelist consolidation of the power of elected officials and their enrichment. This politicised governance of land is tolerated by the central government, which also uses the law to serve its political allies and promote its own projects.

Smart Land Governance: Towards a Conceptual Framework

Global environmental governance (GEG) is one of the world’s major attempts to address climate change issues through mitigation and adaptation strategies. Despite a significant improvement in GEG’s structural, human, and financial capital, the global commons are decaying at an unprecedented pace. Among the global commons, land has the largest share in GEG. Land use change, which is rooted in increasing populations and urbanization, has a significant role in greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions. As a response, land governance and, consequently, good land governance, have arisen as normative concepts emerging from a series of success factors (notably economic development, environmental conservation, and social justice) to achieve greater sustainability. However, global land governance has shown little success in helping GEG due to the lack of intellectual and flexible thinking over governing the land sector. Consequently, reforming land governance “in a smart way” is one of the most critical actions that could contribute to achieving GEG goals. Hence, we propose a smart land governance (SLG) system that will be well addressed, understood, and modeled in a systemic and dynamic way. A smart system may be smart enough to adapt to different contexts and intellectual responses in a timely fashion. Accordingly, SLG is able to promote shared growth and solve many land sector problems by considering all principles of good land governance. Therefore, in order to enhance adaptive land governance systems, efficient land administration and management are required. This study’s outcomes will raise the comprehension of the problems of land management, providing an excellent framework to help land planners and policy-makers, as well as the development of strategic principles with respect to the principal multidimensional components of SLG.

Rural cadastral implementation and its effect on women’s landholding use rights in Amhara region, Ethiopia

For the last several years, access to and control over land has been one of the major problems encountered by women in many developing countries. As part of the effort to ensure the land right of the rural community, the Ethiopian government has been carrying out the preparation of rural land cadastre and provision of landholding certificates. This study aimed to investigate the contribution of rural cadastre to ensuring women's land rights and economic empowerment. The research employed mixed research method to generate quantitative and qualitative data and the data was subject to descriptive analysis. The finding of this research revealed that the practice of the rural cadastre has enabled women to get their land registered and certified and issuance of second-level land certificates has helped them develop a great sense of security on their landholding rights. This, in turn, has given them the opportunity to exercise land transactions with confidence to improve their livelihoods. This study also indicated that rural cadastral practice has immensely reduced women's land right disputes which occurred due to deceptive practices of men. Despite the positive outcomes, this study also realized gaps in the cadastral law provisions related to administering rural cadastral practice and enhancing the efficiency of land registration and certification. The participation of women in the process of rural cadastral practice was minimal. The incident was more visible in married women whose husbands claimed that they took responsibility for handling the case. Therefore, to ensure robust landholding use rights for women, this study suggests the need for providing continuous training for women on clarifying interests on land and rural cadastral practice. And, the training should be supported with a simple and easily understandable communication strategies that enable them identify and clear errors in cadastral maps showing parcels registered in their names. Further, rural cadastral law must be formulated to govern interests on land and cadastral practice properly. Public institutions such as courts and justice offices are essential partners that need to exhibit strong coordination to ensure women's land rights, to enforce laws and sustain good land governance in the region. These interventions need commitment of the government and active support from non-government organizations.

How Can the Risk of Misconduct in Land Expropriation for Tract Development Be Prevented and Mitigated: A Study of “Good Land Governance” Inspection in China

In the context of China’s new round of land reform, narrowing the scope of land expropriation, standardising the procedures for land expropriation, and building a unified urban and rural construction land market have become the objectives of land expropriation reform. The new Land Management Law of the People’s Republic of China confirms land expropriation for tract development as a new situation for the land acquisition system. However, in the process of implementing the system, the new land acquisition mode is plagued by the dual dilemma of the falsification of public interests and the lack of a mechanism to realise public interests, which leads to the real risk of misconduct in standards. The concept of the coordination of interests and co-operative governance in “Good Land Governance” is a sure way to overcome this structural risk. The article analyses the causes through the lens of “Good Land Governance” and concludes that the risk of failure of the standards can be addressed through the binary public good remedy: On the one hand, from the perspective of coordination of interests, drawing on the principle of proportionality, the system can be built by improving the way of purposeful examination, so as to achieve the effect of preventing the risk of deflating and generalising public interests in order to achieve the effect of realising and reinforcing public interests. On the other hand, from the perspective of synergistic shared governance and drawing on the logic of land justice, institutional insight can be built by way of establishing a pattern of shared public interest, thus achieving the effect of preventing the risk of public interest erosion in order to achieve the effect of shared public interest replenishment.

Socio-economic and Political Drivers of Renewable Natural Resource Conflicts among Crop Farmers in Southeast Nigeria

The natural resource conflicts happen when there is variation on how natural resources and related ecosystems should be managed, owned, allocated, used, and protected. However, most researches on resource conflicts among different users, could not see the primacy of looking into these conflicts from the angle of their socio-economic and political causes. This paper among other things sought the socio-economic and political triggers of renewable natural resources conflict in Southeastern parts of Nigeria. Data were collected from 300 crop farmers purposively selected from three States - Imo, Abia and Enugu, using structured questionnaire and oral interview. Percentage and mean were used to analyze the collected data. The renewable natural resources considered in the study area were water, crop land, forests, and fishers/marine resources among others. The socio-political drivers of renewable resources conflict includes demand induced scarcity (87.7%), environmental degradation (83.3%), migration of people (91.6%) and unclear rights (85.3%). The study found that to reduce the occurrence of natural resource conflicts, following measures should be in place; reducing vulnerability to resources scarcity (M=3.57), increased availability of scarce resources (M=3.60), discourage/stop degradation (M=2.50), good governance framework (M=3.36) and effective resource sharing agreement (M=3.56) among others. It is recommended to resolve the natural resource conflicts which can be achieved by equal distribution of resources, clear rights to resources and good land governance.

Peri-urban land governance and market dynamics: perceptions and adaptation strategies of smallholder farmers in Tamale, Ghana

ABSTRACT Access to land is critical to reducing poverty and ensuring sustained agrarian livelihoods. However, access and security of rights are shaped by land governance regimes. With increased population and urbanization, peri-urban frontiers have become key battlegrounds for control of land rights. Using the Tamale area in Ghana as a case study, we examined the perceptions of smallholder farmers on land governance practices and adaptation strategies. In a multi-stage sampling process, the study interviewed 86 smallholder farmers in five communities. The study revealed that good land governance indicators, ‘Recognition and Enforcement of Rights,’ ‘Efficient and Effective Conflict and Dispute Management,’ ‘Subsidiarity and Inclusiveness,’ as well as ‘Transparency and Accountability’ were generally below the minimum good practices benchmark based on smallholder farmers’ assessment. With the increasing deprivation of their land use rights, farmers switch to non-agricultural businesses, and/or seek refuge in nearby communities to farm either by renting or engaging in sharecropping arrangements. The results of this study underscore the need to improve land governance practices – specifically, compensation payment, transparency and accountability for land revenues, disputes resolution, and consultation on land use conversions.

Analysing land policy processes with stages model: Land policy cases of Ethiopia and Rwanda

Land policies are formulated with the goal of addressing land use management challenges. Therefore, a thorough investigation is required to assess effectiveness of land policy processes. The unknown land use policy effectiveness is how and where the formulation and identification of land use problems affect the throughput of policy implementation. The main objective of this paper is to assess the effectiveness of land policy processes using models of public policy analysis. The study analyses how the stages model could be useful for analysis, and in which areas the advocacy coalition framework (ACF) could enhance the analysis. For comparative insights, land policy cases of Ethiopia and Rwanda were used. Data on land policy processes in the two cases were gathered from literature and data collected from field. The analysis with the two models shows that the effectiveness of executing land use policy processes does not only rely on the conventional cycle and sequence of land use policy implementation steps (i.e. identification of the problem, formulation of the solution, execution of the solution). Instead, during the problem formulation certain dynamics occur which may prevent finding the right and only solution. The stages model is useful for analyzing manifestations as they occur along processes, and the ACF is required as a valuable model to enhance analysis by understanding the cause of manifestations. This study would impact the research method for analyzing effectiveness of land policy processes and improving practices of policy making on the basis of good land governance and public administration perspective.

Critical Gaps in Land Governance with Respect to the Land Registration System in Ethiopia

Land registration is a useful land information system practised in almost all modern nations. It is also true that many land registration systems fail due to a number of reasons. This article investigates whether the land registration system in Ethiopia has given due attention to sound land governance components which are critical for the success of any land registration system. Doctrinal and content analysis of legislative documents of Ethiopia is applied to this end. Desk review of relevant secondary material was also used. The article discusses the general role of good governance in such systems and shows the benefits of a land registration system that is exercised under good governance. A conceptual framework is used by which the land registration governance system of Ethiopia is weighed. I argue that the land registration system of Ethiopia has major gaps of land governance. Good land governance in land registration of the country could be enhanced by the provision of adequate legislative and policy framework, effective land registration institutional organs and efficient processes for the enforcement of the system.

Land, investment and production in agrarian transformation in Zimbabwe

The study reviews the Fast Track Land Reform Programme in Zimbabwe and investigates the extent to which it provided incentives for investment and technology adoption to increase labor productivity in the agricultural sector. It is informed by an agrarian transformation theoretical framework that is underpinned by Engel’s Law and the Timmer-Mellor development trajectory. Use is made of a desk study of relevant literature and empirical data drawn from various organizations that have been tracking the progress of the land reform programme. Findings from the study show that the Fast Track Land Reform Programme delivered well on equity and social justice but much less on land use efficiency and environmental conservation as technology adoption and investment by reform beneficiaries remained low. Low public investments in infrastructure and services constrained trade and agrarian transformation. Land reform that integrates technology adoption and investments is needed and scope exists towards this through proper attention to land governance, land tenure and macroeconomic policies in general. Good land governance has a positive impact on public and private investment and therefore technology adoption, the key ingredient for increased labor productivity in the agricultural sector.

Building on “Traditional” Land Dispute Resolution Mechanisms in Rural Ghana: Adaptive or Anachronistic?

Despite the ongoing land administration reforms being implemented across sub-Saharan Africa (SSA), including Ghana, as a viable pathway to achieve tenure security and greater efficiency in land administration, the subject of land dispute resolution has received relatively less attention. Whereas customary tenure institutions play a central role in land administration (controlling ~80% of all land in Ghana), they remain at the fringes of the formal land dispute adjudicatory process. Recognising the pivotal role of traditional institutions as development agents and potential vehicles for promoting good land governance, recent discourses on land tenure have geared toward mainstreaming traditional land dispute institutions into the architecture of the formal judicial process via alternative dispute resolution pathways. Yet, little is known, at least empirically, as to the operations of traditional dispute resolution institutions in the contemporary context. This study therefore explores the importance of traditional dispute resolution institutions in the management of land-related disputes in southcentral and western Ghana, drawing on data collated from 380 farming households operating 746 plots. The results show that contrary to the conventional thinking that traditional institutions are anachronistic and not fit for purpose, they remain strong and a preferred forum for land dispute resolution (proving resilient and adaptable), given the changing socio-economic and tenurial conditions. Yet, these forums have differing implications for different actors within the customary spheres accessing them. The results highlight practical ways for incorporating traditional dispute resolution in the overall land governance setup in Ghana and elsewhere in sub-Saharan Africa. This has implications for redesigning context-specific and appropriate land-use policy interventions that address local land dispute resolution.

Collective land certification policy for improving good land governance

The land is a very limited resource, so the right to land will cause problems if it is managed improperly. The research is a socio-juridical research and uses a descriptive method. The results show that collective land certification policy in Indonesia is an effort of the government to regulate land tenure and ownership in realizing fairness, benefit and legal certainty. However, its implementation is not undertaken in a planned and gradual manner so that the issuance of title deed in the mass land registration does not consider the formal and material validities of the land certificate. The implementation of state-funded mass land registration as an effort by the state to create fairness, benefit and legal certainty over land tenure and ownership needs to be implemented in a planned and gradual manner. The stage is the first year of research, for measuring in the second year and the issuance of a land titling certificate in the third year. The implementation of gradual and planned land registration will affect the quality of the title deed as issued because the issuance is undertaken by referring to the principle of good land governance.

Land tenure and urban climate resilience in the South Pacific

ABSTRACTUrbanisation trends and global environmental change are two of the most critical modern-day stressors threatening the resilience of cities around the world. This paper focuses on Honiara, the capital city of the Solomon Islands, which is experiencing rapid urbanisation and a resultant spread of informal settlements. Similar to other primary cities in the South Pacific, the rate of urbanisation is severely testing the local government’s ability to respond to growing levels of informality; and increasing the climate vulnerability of residents. Based on recent urban climate resilience and land tenure research conducted for the United Nations Human Settlements Programme (UN-Habitat) and the Global Land Tool Network (GLTN) respectively, the paper analyses land issues in two informal settlements in Honiara to highlight the inter-linkages between security of land tenure and climate vulnerability, and how insecure land tenure adversely impacts local adaptive capacity and adaptation planning. This analysis is embedded in the context of the South Pacific region, where duality tensions exist between Western-influenced land tenure arrangements within cities - a legacy of colonial times - and customary arrangements that operate in the surrounding peri-urban and provincial areas. Given the identification of strong links between security of land tenure and climate vulnerability, and the complexity of property rights in the region, the paper argues that principles of good land governance are an essential component of climate resilience thinking and actions.

Gestión territorial: el tema pendiente en la planificación territorial en Honduras y Centroamérica

En Honduras existen importantes avances vinculados al Ordenamiento y la Planificación Territorial, para compartir un caso, fue el primer país de Centroamérica en contar con una Ley de Ordenamiento Territorial (2003). Sin embargo, se cuentan a nivel nacional con 763 planes territoriales a escala municipal que poseen diferentes enfoques, de ellos, muy pocos han logrado tener una fase de implementación. Por lo que los resultados a nivel de sociedad y territorio no son tangibles. Casos similares se presentan en el resto de la Región Centroamericana. Por lo anterior es necesario generar los espacios, herramientas institucionales y técnicos municipales capacitados para fomentar la implementación de estos procesos, para garantizar una buena gobernanza del suelo, incidiendo de manera directa en la mejora de la calidad de vida de la población, como finalidad máxima del Ordenamiento Territorial.

The role of Customary Land Secretariats in promoting good local land governance in Ghana

In Ghana, Chiefs and families have over the years controlled access and managed customary lands based on the rules of custom in their respective jurisdictions. The Land Administration Project (LAP) sought to strengthen customary land management by establishing Customary Land Secretariats (CLSs) for recognized and organized land owning communities to promote good local land governance. The analyses show that the Wa Central Customary Land Secretariat (WCCLS) has done considerably well in land documentation and disputes resolution. However, inadequate cooperation and collaboration between the customary and formal land management systems in the area; rising number of individual landowners due to changes in the social structure; and lack of accountability are hampering good land governance.

INCORPORATING GOOD LAND GOVERNANCE IN THE DISASTER REGION OF YOGYAKARTA

Land is one of the most major capitals in our life. Without it, sustainability of human existence is very impossible. Unfortunately, land problems in Indonesia have unique challenges compared to other countries. Many of kinds of challenges are in the form of the natural disasters. This paper is going to measure how well the principles of good governance has been incorporated in the Yogyakarta Special Region Land administration System generally by studying on the Merapi Disaster Mitigation, particularly in how land planning for the Merapi Disaster’s victims is performed. The research methodology employs a combined research method, it means that fundamental principles in process and its output of both the doctrinal and non doctrinal approaches is synergized to based on the research’s activity unites. Configuration of the land administration systems in achieving people prosperity has been affected by evolution of political, cultural, and legal awareness of local communities and central government policy. To conclude, incorporating a disaster response based land policy principles requires an integrated law and policy making system among parties through the implementation of good governance principle in the record of public participation voices and sustainable development interests. Notable reports illustrate that the good land governance incorporation encouraged and inspired land planning system to be more efficient and effective. Particularly in the natural disaster mitigation and reconstruction, incorporating good land governance principles furthermore encourages land policy makers to achieve the responsive land management in line with social demands and sustainable development programs.

Good Governance, Efficiency and the Provision of Planned Land for Orderly Development in African Cities: The Case of the 20,000 Planned Land Plots Project in Dar es Salaam, Tanzania

In many African cities, governments have been unable to provide sufficient appropriately located and priced planned and serviced urban land to meet demand. As a result, informal settlements are growing faster than the rest of the city. Efforts to deal with this situation are hampered by several factors including lack of resources to acquire and service land to forestall haphazard development. In 2003, the Ministry of Lands, using borrowed funds from the Treasury, undertook an ambitious land servicing project in Dar es Salaam. The aims were to: alleviate the shortage of surveyed and serviced urban plots; tackle the rapid increase of informal settlements; control land speculation; address corruption; complement the national drive to reduce poverty; develop satellite towns; and implement the ruling Party’s manifesto on liveable human settlements. This paper evaluates this undertaking from a good governance point of view. The Project was efficiently implemented. Over 40,000 plots were produced and sold; the invested billions of shillings were recouped several times over; and replication was enabled. However, it increased poverty among those whose land was acquired; and fuelled the growth of informal settlements. With less than 17% of the plots categorized as low cost, the Project was not pro-poor. Outcomes included the realization that land had value that could be unlocked with servicing. This has spawned several projects involving servicing land for sale, undertaken by other authorities and the private sector. This, however, is excluding low income households. The Project’s achievements were realized at the expense of good land governance exemplified by: lack of coordination among key players; shortfalls in transparency, public participation, institutional decentralisation and inclusiveness; and neglect of environmental fallouts. Low income households were in practice excluded from this and subsequent money-driven land delivery schemes, a trend that needs to be reversed to avoid social polarization.

Towards good land governance in Ukraine

The article presents the analysis of transformation of land governance system in Ukraine and explores peculiarities of every component of that system. The carried investigation reveals problematic aspects and the ways for improvement of state land policy, land reform conducting, land management instruments applying and land administration system building to promote good governance in land sector of Ukraine.

A human rights-based approach: A gate to development of African women's land rights?

The global competition for African land is at a historical peak. Local effects of large-scale land acquisitions depend on multiple factors, but women's rights and livelihoods are generally very fragile due to historical and contemporary injustices. Good land governance is important for turning the land acquisitions into equal and equitable development opportunities. The human rights-based approach promotes good governance by adding strength and legal substance to the principles of participation and inclusion, openness and transparency, accountability and the rule of law, and equality and nondiscrimination. By empowering rights-holders and enhancing duty-bearers' capacity, international development cooperation can lead to wider and more gender-balanced inclusion of civil society in negotiations of large-scale land acquisitions and greater adherence of duty-bearers to the rule of law. This is especially important in African countries with large amounts of land and weak legal and institutional frameworks to protect rights, especially those of women.