Land Admin SystemsSummary
Draft for Ken's approval
Land administration sets the "rules of the game" for property rights, including safeguards. It is not an end in itself. Its goals are secure tenure, social stability and economic development. Developed economies have effective systems that grew over decades. Many developing economies face a gap, with unregistered land and insecure rights.
Aid projects aim to close this gap. Some benefits come quickly. Once land is registered, for example, disputes tend to fall. Economic benefits, such as government revenue and bank lending, take longer. They depend on long-term public trust and high integrity of records. A major challenge is keeping the gains going from in-country budgets once aid ends.
Because these systems took decades to evolve, typical 3 to 5 year aid projects may be too short for lasting results. Strategy Dynamics is proposed as a way to "bench test" improvement proposals with numbers before funds are committed. Graphs of performance over time let different strategies be compared side by side.
Key points
- Land administration sets the "rules of the game", including safeguards, as a means to social stability and economic development.
- Aid in land administration assumes that bringing it close to developed-economy standards will add significantly to stability and development.
- Social benefits can come quickly after registration, but economic benefits depend on long-term public trust and the integrity of records.
- Land administration in developed countries evolved over decades, so projects of 3 to 5 years, or even 10 years, may be too short.
- A complementary approach is needed to test improvement proposals for effectiveness, openly and with numbers, before large funding is committed, with all assumptions made explicit.