Successful completion of two short courses on land administration

ISSUE 45: MARCH-MAY 2007

The newsletter of United Nations University and its international
network of research and training centres/programmes

ITC School for Land Administration Studies, an associated institution of UNU, conducted two short courses on land administration last year – its contribution to the worldwide programme of capacity building in land administration supporting socio-economic development and poverty reduction programmes in developing countries.

The first course – Geo-Information for Land Administration in Africa: Trends and Innovation – was held in Kumasi, Ghana, June 19-30 and was jointly organised with the Department of Geomatic Engineering at Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology (KNUST) in Kumasi, Ghana.

It attracted 32 participants from eight African countries – Burkina Faso, Ethiopia, Kenya, Ghana, Namibia, Rwanda, Tanzania and Uganda – including practitioners, local traditional chiefs, academics and professionals, from various national and local organisations.

Keynote speaker was Prof. Karl Harmsen, director of UNU Institute for Natural Resources in Africa (UNU-INRA), who gave some impressive examples of land administration applications in natural resource management in support of sustainable development.

Issues discussed included land policy reform with respect to statutory and customary tenures and its impact on sustainable development and market economics. Participants voiced strong support for the idea of conducting periodic surveys of stakeholders to develop a communication model and developing human resources for land administration in combination with Geo-ICT.

The second course was organised for the Southeast Asian Region in cooperation with the Department of Geodesy and Geomatics Engineering of Gadjah Mada University (GMU), in Yogyakarta, Indonesia, September 4-14. Twenty-three professionals and six academics from Bangladesh, Cambodia, India, Indonesia, Nepal, Pakistan, the Philippines and Vietnam participated.

The keynote speaker was Dr Joyo Winoto, chairman of the National Land Agency (BPN), who introduced philosophical and innovative concepts for reconstructing land administration systems and community-based adjudication in Indonesia. Sessions focused on land administration and the changing environment, from concept to practice. Land administration is more than just registration. It is about implementing comprehensive land policies for everyone.

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