Govt gets $55m to process land titles for the poor

Jun 18, 2014

The lands ministry has received a $55m loan from the World Bank to issue one million land titles for the poor in rural and peri-urban areas.

By Pascal Kwesiga

The lands ministry has received a $55m loan from the World Bank to issue one million land titles for the poor in rural and peri-urban areas.


The move is aimed at enabling customary and communal land owners acquire land titles to participate in a modern economy by using land to access loan facilities.

The initiative is part of a raft of reforms the government has approved to promote better management and development of the land sector to contribute to efforts to transform the country from peasantry to an industrialized one with a vibrant services sector.

Part of the money will be used to operationalize the land fund. The government intends to give loans to tenants to buy off land lords using the land fund. It also plans to use money from the land fund to buy land and resettle the landless.

The loan that was approved by Parliament is part of the World Bank’s $100m loan issued under the competitive and enterprise development project in sub-Saharan Africa.

Under the project, the government will meet the surveying costs of the land while the land owners would be required to pay sh20, 000 and sh50, 000 for application and registration for the titles respectively.

Currently, the process of surveying and acquiring a land title costs between sh2m to sh5m or beyond depending on the location of the land and the surveyor.

The lands minister, Daudi Migereko, said the money will also be spent on establishment of the national land policy implementation secretariat to spearhead the reforms, undertaking legislative and regulatory reforms in the land sector, protecting and improving women’s land rights and carrying out land related research and studies to inform policy implementation.

RELATED ARTICLES

Migereko warns forgers of land titles

Processing a land title to take minutes

Over 100 city land titles to be cancelled

Are land titles from real estate agents genuine?

 

(adsbygoogle = window.adsbygoogle || []).push({});