Land professionals heed calls for reform
By Paul van der Molen

Registrars and surveyors increasingly heed the calls for more responsive land management and sustainable urban planning policies. Encouraged by the UN system, the International Federation of Surveyors [Fédération Internationale des Géomètres (FIG)] is involved in an unprecedented effort to enable land management systems to meet the needs of 21st century urban society.

The UN Earth Summit in Rio de Janeiro in 1992, the HABITAT II conference on cities in Istanbul in 1996 and the World Summit on Sustainable Development in Johannesburg in 2002 were wake-up calls for land professionals around the world. These have since shed their conservative reputation and done their best to reform existing systems in keeping with the UN recommendations.

The FIG brings together the professional bodies from about 50 countries and has as many correspondents in other countries. The commission on cadastre and land management, known as Commission 7, spearheads the FIG reform drive.

Responding to UN calls

As required by the UN, reforms include improving land management systems and promotion of secure tenure, transparent market procedures, easy access to credit and land use planning and development, along with appropriate land registration and cadastral systems.

In recent years FIG has produced a number of landmark declarations and policy documents. Cooperation with the UN and the World Bank resulted in the 1996 Bogor and 1999 Bathurst declarations. Then came two major policy documents, Cadastre 2014 in 1998 and Benchmarking Cadastral Systems in 2002.

Also last year the Commission organized a symposium in Pretoria, South Africa, to review the practical aspects of land redistribution. The focus was on how to develop easy, accessible, and transparent procedures for registration and cadastre in order to meet society's demands in a more effective sort of way.

More recently, at its April 2003 conference in Paris, FIG assessed the current state of land legislation, registration and cadastral systems across the world, identifying options and bottlenecks.

These efforts go to show that professionals no longer see administration systems as ends in themselves and that, instead, they are keen to respond to the requirements of 21st century society.

Professionals are well aware that existing land management systems must be able to respond effectively to such political objectives as poverty eradication, sustainable agriculture, sustainable settlements and strengthening the roles of farmers, women and indigenous groups.

Professionals are well aware that existing land management systems must be able to respond effectively to such political objectives as poverty eradication, sustainable agriculture, sustainable settlements and strengthening the roles of farmers, women and indigenous groups.

Effective implementation of such policies makes a number of demands on land management systems, including security of tenure, land market regulation, land use planning, development and control, management of natural resources, land taxation, land reform and access to credit.

Such interaction between general policies and effective implementation further highlights the significant role society now expects land management to play in its own advancement and well-being. So far, land registrars and surveyors had absorbed themselves in complex procedures and complete accuracy, regardless of society's demands. Now they realise that there is no better way to justify investment in state-of-the-art information technology than to highlight the significant role of land management in modern, largely urban society.

Breaking with the past

The need for adequate and affordable software is bringing about a fair degree of standardisation across national land management systems. Together with academics and professionals, FIG Commission 7 (Cadastre and Land Management) is developing a `core cadastral domain'. This cheap generic data system would form the basis of every land registry and cadastre, and it would take some customisation to adapt it to specific needs and requirements.

This project again highlights the major turn-about taking place among land professionals. To date, they have made a point of highlighting differences (and alleged superiority) rather than convergence across national systems.

In a further break with the past, the FIG has also come to recognize the role of customary land tenure and more generally of customary law. The focus so far had been on formal property rights and title to land. Today, professionals acknowledge the importance of customary forms of tenure and land use. The practical upshot is that as statutory law itself is being reformed in many countries, it often includes clauses that recognize customary rights and more or less integrate customary law in the statute book.

These developments in turn put land professionals under additional pressure to devise and provide suitably flexible land registry and cadastral systems. The way these systems need to adjust and accommodate the new demands of statutory reform is one of the major challenges the profession now faces.

But then FIG members are well aware that today there exists a tight relationship between political objectives, land policy, land policy instruments and land administration systems. Challenging as the new demands on them may be, land professionals are doing everything they can to meet them as effectively as possible.

Paul van der Molen is Chair of Commission 7 (Cadastre and Land Management) of the International Federation of Surveyors (FIG).