Reflections for the Smarter Designs of Land Administration Reforms Webinar

You can watch the recorded webinar via YouTube by following this link: Smarter Design of Land Administration Reform – YouTube

Recently, we virtually “met up” with Stella Rose Akutui, the Capacity Building and Networking Officer with LANDnet. Stella has been one of many amazing Ugandan women driving the women’s land rights agenda – we celebrate her achievements and the avenues around which Uganda is leading the thinking and action on land rights in Africa.

The Mekong Region Land Governance (MRLG) project, together with our partners at the United Nations’ Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) and the Land Portal, will organise the 3rd Mekong Regional Land Forum (MRLF2021) in the coming weeks, entitled “Land tenure in Mekong forest landscapes: advancing the recognition of customary rights and responsible investment practices”.  This forum will bring together reform-minded actors within and beyond the region to engage in in-depth, interactive debate on issues that cut to the core of the most pressing challenges facing tenure security in forest areas and the impacts of  agribusiness investment.

A pivotal case study conducted during Phase one of the Mekong Region Land Governance (MRLG) project was “Policy Influencing and Advocacy on the 2017 Vietnam Law on Forestry”. Implemented by the Forestland Coalition (FORLAND), the initiative demonstrated how to successfully influence the Forestry Law to improve the security of land rights for ethnic forest communities and traditional forest protectors.

The Mekong Region Land Governance (MRLG) project and the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO) held their second Regional Land Forum in Bangkok on 28-30 May 2018.

The year has gone quickly for the LEI team working on the One Map Technical Assistance project in Indonesia. The primary objective of this technical assistance was to assist with the project preparation of the One Map Project – a project to support the implementation and acceleration of Indonesia’s One Map Policy. Working alongside the two implementing agencies – the National Land Agency (BPN) and the Geospatial Information Agency (BIG) – as well as the World Bank, the LEI team prepared a series of background and project preparation reports detailing the project design of the One Map Project. These are now ready for review and appraisal by the Government of Indonesia and the World Bank, and the project wrapped up at the beginning of February.

Tanzania’s Land Tenure Support Programme (LTSP) has again demonstrated that there is strong national and sectoral leadership and commitment to improved land service delivery and transparency in Tanzania. In any land project there is always a need for strong communication and coordination within and between government and non-government stakeholders. The LTSP has recently established a Multi Stakeholder Group (MSG) to best facilitate and improve inter-agency cooperation, in support of land tenure reform as envisioned under the Strategic Plan for Implementation of Land Laws (SPILL) 2013.

Here at LEI and Gret’s Mekong Region Land Governance project we are moving towards the end of Phase 1 in June. We expect a relatively seamless shift into the second phase, which is anticipated to start in July this year, for another four years.

LEI has secured the Technical Assistance and Capacity Development for the Program Preparation to Operationalize and Accelerate the One Map Policy (One Map TA project). This 12-month TA project commenced in February 2017. It aims to support One Map Policy (OMP) implementation and strengthen the National Spatial Data Infrastructure (NSDI) through the early completion of OMP coverage across all of Indonesia.

Spatial planning and One Map Policy in Indonesia