Land Use Rights Research Articles

Gender, Household Headship and Entitlements to Land: New Vulnerabilities in Vietnam’s Decollectivization

The process of decollectivization in Vietnam, leading up to the 1993 Land Law, ensured farming households the rights to market their own produce and to transfer, exchange, lease, inherit, and mortgage their land-use rights. These changes imply a reworking of relations between state, market, and household, but also within households. Although the allocation of agricultural land in northern Vietnam was relatively equitable, allocation by the state represents only one channel of entitlements to land. The market represents a second, and customary or kinshipmediated channels, such as inheritance, are a third. This article examines the gendered dimensions of entitlements to land, particularly among female-headed households. While increasing attention is being directed to the nexus of gender and poverty and to the experiences of households headed by women, insufficient consideration is given to the diversity of female-headed households, and associated differences in livelihood vulnerability and entitlements to land. This gap is addressed through a case study in one village in northern Vietnam. The concluding discussion offers some directions concerning Vietnamese feminisms and decollectivization dynamics as agendas for future research.

Tradable Land-Use Rights for Cumulative Environmental Effects Management

In this paper we introduce tradable land-use rights (TLRs) as a potential economic instrument for cumulative environmental effects management on public lands. TLRs allow the regulator to implement thresholds for habitat loss while maximizing the benefits of development. By allowing economic criteria to drive the configuration of development activities in a region, the risk of biodiversity loss may be reduced for a given cost. Alberta's Boreal Forest Natural Region is used as a case study for examining TLRs. Implementation issues, particularly those related to spatial heterogeneity and ecosystem dynamics, are discussed.

Rural reforms and changes in land management and attitudes: a case study from inner Mongolia, China.

The international science community stresses the importance of the local perspective in the context of dryland degradation. This paper explores changes in management and attitudes in a mixed farming system in northern China, since the introduction of the economic reforms in the early 1980s, and the following changes in land-use rights. The area encompasses a dune landscape scattered with crop-land, as well as the Daqinggou Nature Reserve, an area of natural vegetation. According to farmers new varieties of maize in combination with increased use of fertilizers have improved yields, though high yield variability persists due to erratic rainfall. Farmers acknowledge the importance of the 30-year contract on cultivated land in 1997 for their investment in long-term management, but emphasize the importance of chemical fertilizers for short-term economic survival. The farmers stressed the negative impact of grazing and cultivation on soil erosion and stated that differences in vegetation composition and cover in the nature reserve are due to anthropogenic factors.

Colliding Worlds

In this paper I suggest a number of reasons for concluding that Australia's existing Plant Intellectual Property system (henceforth system) is incompatible with the provision of adequate protection of ownership of indigenous peoples' traditional plant knowledge.2 The incompatibility of the existing PIP system with adequate protection of traditional plant knowledge is deeply troubling since its provision is morally, legally and politically required. First, the moral requirement to provide for indigenous traditional knowledge protection derives from the imperative to recognise the moral right of indigenous peoples to such protection. The existence of such a right is prima facie established by the common law recognition (in the Native Title principle expressed in the High Court's 1992 Mabo decision) that indigenous peoples have rights of land use, occupation and access where continuity of practice and interest can be demonstrated. A strong case can be made that indige nous ownership rights over plant resources and traditional knowledge

Development of a Vietnamese Land Appraisal System using GIS.

Nowadays in Vietnam, although still adopting the policy that land itself is not individual property, land-use rights, such as exchange, transfer, rent, inheritance or mortgage, are considered as property in reality. This means that a trading market of land-use rights is emerging and becom-ing increasingly popular. In order to manage and develop this market, it is necessary for Vietnam to have a land appraisal system based on market economy principles. On the other hand, the develop-ment of a GIS and its applications to property appraisal can help the property appraisal to be more convenient and accurate. Recently, a Vietnamese National Geographical Information System is in the first step of development and the GIS will be applied in many other fields such as the environ-ment, cadastres, etc. This paper proposes a land valuation system for Vietnam after considering other countries' property valuation systems, especially the Korean Official Announced Land Price, and applies GIS techniques for the system. Especially by network analysis, distances from the main roads are computed in the real distances travelled along the roads rather than calculated perpendi-cular distances.

Regulation, Land-Use Mix, and Urban Performance. Part 2: Simulation

Part 1 of this two-part paper presented a spatial economic model of the urban development process which captures developers' profit-seeking behaviour, communities' welfare-seeking behaviour, and the mediating effects of alternative systems of land-use rights. Different systems of rights were shown to result in different land-use and density outcomes. In part 2 we describe the simulation model used to implement the theoretical model. The emphasis is on explaining the cellular automata methodology, but we also go on to illustrate the model output by comparing the structure and economic performance of two simulations. One simulates a free-market city in which developers have full property rights over land use. The other simulates a city in which the community has land-use rights and uses these to regulate development densities at socially optimal levels.

Land-Use Rights in Mainland China: Problems and Recommendations for Improvement

The Chinese property market is founded on a land use rights (LUR) system that is based on the Hong Kong leasehold system. It was first tested in the Shenzhen Special Economic Zone. The positive result led to the formal revival of the property market in mainland China in 1990. Coupled with the open-door policy, this new tenure system has brought about marked changes to the real estate environment in mainland China. There has been a number of papers about the LUR system. Among the writers, Walker and Li (1994) have written on “Land Use Rights Reform and Real Estate Market in China.” This article is intended to be an extension to Walker and Li's work and focuses on the problems associated with the LUR system. It concludes with recommendations for improvement.

Land-Use Rights in Mainland China: Problems and Recommendations for Improvement

The Chinese property market is founded on a land use rights (LUR) system that is based on the Hong Kong leasehold system. It was first tested in the Shenzhen Special Economic Zone. The positive res...

‘Placing nature’: the politics of collaboration and represent ation in the struggle for La Sierra in San Luis, Colorado

Collaboration among rural communities and resource management agencies represents an increasing trend in US public lands management and conflict resolution. This paper examines the failed effort of the Sangre de Cristo Land Grant Commission to resolve a dispute over local land-use rights in San Luis, Colorado. The Commission’s proposal to purchase the land on behalf of the state and restore historical usufruct rights was hindered by a conceptual framework reflecting colonialist socio-environmental relations. The conceptual incongruence between this framework and the ‘alternative’ environmental values and perspectives the Commission sought to accommodate produced tensions and inconsistencies in the Commission’s attempt to justify the proposal. These tensions are expressed through the dialectical representations of nature and place. Presentations of place serve simultaneously to divide ‘nature’ from ‘society’ and attach externalized values and meanings to ‘nature’ as part of a place identity. In this way, nature becomes ‘placed.’

Changing Spatial Distribution and Determinants of Land Development in Chinese Cities in the Transition from a Centrally Planned Economy to a Socialist Market Economy: A Case Study of Guangzhou

The spatial distribution and locational characteristics of land development have changed dramatically in Chinese cities since the land reform of 1987 which allowed the paid transfer of land-use rights—i.e. land leasing. This has led to the rapid transformation of the urban spatial structure of Chinese cities. There is an urgent need to study the general trend of such changes and their policy implications. However, due to the lack of data, such investigations lag far behind the rapid land development in Chinese cities. This paper attempts to examine the new spatial pattern of land development in Chinese cities and its determinants by studying land development in Guangzhou before (1979-87) and after (1987-92) the land reform by analysing data obtained from aerial photographs with the aid of GIS techniques. The determinants of land development are analysed using a logistic regression model. It is found that there has been significant acceleration of urban redevelopment and urban sprawl in Guangzhou since the adoption of the new land-leasing system in 1987. The changing spatial distributions and determinants of land development suggest the emergence of new locational behaviours of land development in Chinese cities in the transition from a centrally planned economy to a socialist market economy.

China's land arrangements and rural labor mobility

Chinese farm families under the Household Responsibility System have the land use-rights but not the rights of alienation. If permanently leaving agriculture, they have to return the land to local authorities and consequently give up a stream of future land earnings. This paper analyzes the deterrent effect of this land arrangement on labor mobility by constructing a household model which considers both part-time farming and permanent migration decisions. The implications of the model are consistent with the recent Chinese experience of rural floating population in cities and the rapid growth of rural nonagricultural employment.

Can China Feed Itself?

This article posits that Chinas demand for food can be met by policy changes that would allow farmers to increase their output per hectare develop unused land for crop production and slow or stop destruction of existing farmland. The government operates under the Household Responsibility System which was established in the late 1970s. The authors visited farmers throughout China during 1987-96 and asked farmers about current farming policy and about their suggestions for increasing output. Small farmers liked the Household Responsibility System and appeared to have an improved standard of living. Crop output was increased by careful weeding better seed carefully applied fertilizer and carefully timed sowing transplanting irrigating and harvesting. Future expansion of output would require extensive investments in irrigation land drainage systems land terracing and leveling and soil upgrades. Much current farmland is less productive due to poor land quality and insufficient irrigation. Although farmers trust that crop yields could double or triple with investment many are fearful of losing control of their land before the return on their investment is obtained. Landholdings may be lost due to the collective reallocation of plots every 3-6 years by giving larger shares to larger household and due to government seizure for nonagricultural purposes. Farmers favor a redistribution based on voluntary sale of land and purchase of perpetual-use rights. Over 80% of farmers interviewed indicated a willingness to invest if permanent access to the land were assured. The government is experimenting in Shanxi province with permanent land use access and 17 other provinces are moving in similar directions. The proposed government pilot projects would extend land-use rights for 75 years for existing farmland and 100 years for usable wasteland. Chinas policy in 1995 extended land rights and changed reallocation practices.

Trade and Investment Opportunities in China: The Current Commercial and Legal Framework (review)

Reviews 87 Dong Shizhong, Danian Zhang, and Milton R. Larson. Trade andInvestment Opportunities in China: The Current Commercial and Legal Framework Westport and London: Quorum Books, 1992. xii, 265 pp. Hardcover $55.00. Like moths to a flame, foreign business people continue to be lured by the booming Chinese economy and its growing legions ofconsumers. Yet, the Tiananmen Incident singed the wings ofmany Westerners. To dispel any lingering doubts, the three authors have written a basic "how-to" guide, which Ambassador James Lilley appropriately describes in his Foreword as "a businessman's book." Lawyers also might be interested in the views of the two Chinese authors, who were legal researchers attached to the National People's Congress in Beijing and the Shanghai People's Congress. Unfortunately, academics will be disappointed by the lack ofin-depth analysis and new insights into China's foreign-trade system. One ofthe authors' stated purposes is to provide a "practical" guide for those businesspeople enticed by the China market. They succinctly describe the basic characteristics of the Chinese economic scene, including a discussion of the different forms ofChinese enterprises, the managerial responsibility system, and problems of material distribution. They also present a thumbnail sketch of the financial system, glance quickly at China's roller-coasting stock market, and ponder China's accession to the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT). The book is especially strong in providing practical tips for establishing foreign -invested enterprises in China. Business people are reminded of the importance of finding the "right" Chinese partner, especially one who possesses the appropriate political, economic, and technological abilities. After briefly analyzing project approval procedures, the authors review various joint-venture laws regulating initial capitalization, foreign exchange balancing, land-use rights, and taxation . A more scholarly treatment on foreign-secured lending is included, based on a 1989 article published by the journal Law and Contemporary Problems. Potential investors furthermore are warned of dangers posed by the international environment such as the growing Chinese trade surplus and the renewal of most-favorednation (MFN) status with the U.S., as well as China's failure to protect intellectual property and its continued dumping on foreign markets. Two of their suggestions need further clarification. The authors recommend that foreign investors obtain local foreign-investment guidelines, which are based on Beijing's internal-investment regulations and policies. To their credit, the au-© 1995 by University ,J1015 cite as an exampie me 1990 Shanghai Investment Guidelines that prohibit oj awai ? ressforeign-invested projects harmful to the natural and "spiritual" environments. The latter category was especially sensitive in the early post-Tiananmen period. 88 China Review International: Vol. 2, No. 1, Spring 1995 The leadership was attempting to prohibit projects "involving news media, publishing , broadcasting and telecasting, telecommunications, foreign trade, domestic business, insurance, or projects that will have an adverse impact on national security . . . [the] national economy and social development" (p. 150). Yet, because the book is virtually devoid ofpolitical risk analysis, the political context of the investment prohibitions is not explained. With the increasing degree ofdecentralization , local governments now enjoy a greater flexibility (tanxing) when implementing State regulations. By investing in Star TV, CNN-Asia, HBO-Asia, and MTV, Western media moguls already have taken advantage of the lax enforcement of satellite receiver restrictions to add to China's "spiritual pollution." However, Chinese flexibility has its limits, as Rupert Murdoch understood when he eliminated BBC news programming from Star TV. To be successful in the China trade, Westerners must conduct themselves in a "politically correct" fashion. Their second suggestion is for potential investors to "sensitize" themselves to Chinese society and culture. The authors warn about the problems of Chinese bureaucracy and wisely advise the befriending of senior Beijing officials, who can expedite local negotiations (p. 201). They also describe the Chinese as extremely sensitive to the appearance of foreign exploitation, which motivates them to seek "equality" in all business ventures. The authors thus argue that any successful negotiation will be based on an understanding and toleration ofcultural differences. While the authors should be congratulated for including a discussion of Chinese negotiation behavior, their arguments would have been strengthened with the inclusion of Lucian Pye's works on political...

A study on regional difference of China’s paid urban landuse system and grading

At present, paid urban landuse system is one of the most important economic reform in China. In the other words, landuse right can be transferred and land users must pay the rent to the state according to the quality of land. It is necessary to apply the theory of rent and location to the economic approaisal of urban land. China is vast in territory. Is’s geographical condition and economic development vary from place to place, so does the urban land value. In order to reveal the difference of land value between different cities, the following method is used. (1) Analysing the factors and elements that affect the quality of urban land. Six factors including 17 elements were selected in this paper: macrolocation of a city, benefit of urban aggregation, infrastructure investment, output value of urban land, potential of urban land, and investment intensity. (2) Deciding the weight andvalue of each factor. (3) Appraising each element separately. (4) Accounting the value of all factors and getting the total appraisal score of each city. (5) Grouping the 430 Chinese cities into sevencategories according to the appraisal values. The result shows that all the cities in the category with the highest land output values are in the coast belt, whereas most cities in the inland and outlying areas are belong to the category with low rank. For example, 87% of the cities in the outlying regions are belong to the lowest rank. Although there are some relationship between the size of cities and urban land rank, generally speaking, the larger the city, the higher the urban land rank. In fact, the locational condition is the most important factor which influences the rank of urban land.

Desertification in the Butana

Within the project “Morphodynamic Processes and Desertification” of the Academy of Sciences in Gottingen, research has been carried out on the desertification of the Butana region in the Sahel of the Rep. of Sudan. The abolition of traditional rights of land use, with the resulting disorganized utilization of grazing lands and the self-generated sedentarization of many formerly nomadic groups, has led to a rapid desertification of the Butana, which was further accelerated by the droughts of the eighties. The combination of substratum and climatic conditions has diversified the extent of site degradation, with an accelerated development of dunes and badlands taking place due to severe vegetation transformation in areas with permanent water supply or with sandy soils.

A Cautionary Note on Public Policies in Conflict: Land Reform and Human Fertility in Rural Egypt

This paper argues that access to land has 2 major dimensions that are likely to influence fertility in opposite directions: 1) the size of holdings to which a family has access for cultivation purposes; and 2) the land ownership regulations which govern the use of land and the distribution of produce from it. The 2 dimensions can act separately or together. An individual may have use rights (renters sharecroppers and lessees) or receive income from management and agricultural production activities; whereas the owner receives an equity return on his investment. An owner-operator receives both types of returns. Data for this paper was drawn from a larger study of fertility and family planning in rural Egypt. Interviews were conducted in 1978 with 685 households randomly selected from 12 villages in Lower Egypt. 561 households in which the female respondent was the only legal wife of the head of the household are used in the final sample. 3 sets of independent variables are studied: land variables socioeconomic variables; and demographic control variables. Fertility is measured by the number of children ever born including stillbirths. The data indicate that fertility is positively related to size of cultivated area; and land ownership is negatively related to fertility. Households with larger holdings could more effectively utilize child labor and therefore had higher fertility rates. However landowners had fewer children because of their higher income; they tended to invest in child quality such as more education and better health care. Such investments are thought to raise the price of children and thus lead to lower fertility. 16% of the land owners compared to 11% of tenents and 22% of landless laborers were currently practicing contraception. The differences are not large enough to be statistically significant although the direction of the relationship is as expected. Failure to attain statistical significance may be due to the low overall use of contraception among rural Egyptian women (17%). These findings illustrate the potential importance of the connection between land ownership policies in the rural sector and population change in less developed countries. Also correlated were female age at marriage and education. More precise information is needed on the fertility impacts of various types of land reforms involving different ownership patterns land-use rights and size of holdings if conflict between land reform policies and population-policies is to be avoided.

State Land Allocation and Class Formation in Nigeria

The distribution of land-use rights both defines and shapes African political economy. Control over land can be utilised in various ways to accumulate capital for either autonomous or comprador investments in the domestic economy. The acquisition of official titles to land concomitantly affords the holder opportunities to exploit those who do not possess this valuable resource. For these reasons, command over land offers the state a powerful means of regulating access to the dominant class. This study focuses on the ways in which allocations of statutory certificates of occupancy have affected the on-going process of class formation in two northern States of Nigeria: Kano and Bauchi. We are particularly interested in identifying, through information collected from a sample of application files, those elements of the population who were admitted and denied access to the dominant class through the land-allocation process during the late military-rule period, 1976–9.

Comparison of Parks, Reserves, and Landscape Protection, in Three Countries of the Eastern Alps

Conservation policies adopted in the Provinces of Tirol (Austria), Salzburg (Austria), Bavaria (West Germany), and Südtirol–Alto Adige (Italy), reflect the specific constitutional settings, management fields, and regional planning strategies, of these four regions in the eastern European Alps. Despite differences in historical–political heritage, their conservation programmes exhibit a number of similarities:1. Early conservation efforts by local communities were justified on the basis of perceived economic benefits, while those of organized conservation groups were directed towards establishing reserves with the objective of strict preservation.2. Government involvement in conservation increased in the 1970s, when comprehensive legislation covering Nature protection and regional planning was enacted by provincial authorithies.3. Much of the land in projected and existing parks or reserves remains in private ownership, and long-held traditional land-use rights are upheld.4. Reserves are established under individual legal ordinances which specify prohibited practices, allowable uses, and permit approval procedures. A land-use zoning approach is used only in the management of National Parks.5. Provincial legislation requires the integration of Nature protection into regional planning policies and programmes (e.g. the Bavarian Recreational Landscape Plan). Efforts to integrate government programmes on an international level have been limited to discussion and consultation.The controversy surrounding the proposed Hohe Tauern National Park (Austria) illustrates that, within a setting of long-established vested interests, it is difficult to reach agreement between provincial governments (with their power-utility corporations), local communities (with their economic self-interest), and environmental groups (with their often strict preservation philosophy).