Land management in support of the millennium development goals

Citation

Stig Enemark, P. (2008), "Land management in support of the millennium development goals", Property Management, Vol. 26 No. 4. https://doi.org/10.1108/pm.2008.11326daa.001

Land management in support of the millennium development goals

Article Type: Editorial From: Property Management, Volume 26, Issue 4

Arguably sound land management is the key to achieve sustainable development and to support the global agenda set by adoption of the millennium development goals (MDGs).

The eight millennium development goals (MDGs) form a blueprint agreed to by all the world’s countries and leading development institutions. The United Nations Millennium Summit, September 2000, established a time limit (2015) and measurable goals and targets for combating poverty, hunger, disease, illiteracy, environmental degradation and discrimination against women. These goals are now placed at the heart of the global agenda. The Summit’s Millennium Declaration also outlined a wide range of commitments in human rights, good governance, and democracy:

1. 1.

   Goal 1: Eradicate extreme poverty and hunger.

2. 2.

   Goal 2: Achieve universal primary education.

3. 3.

   Goal 3: Promote gender equality and empower women.

4. 4.

   Goal 4: Reduce child mortality.

5. 5.

   Goal 5: Improve maternal health.

6. 6.

   Goal 6: Combat HIV/AIDS, malaria and other diseases.

7. 7.

   Goal 7: Ensure environmental sustainability.

8. 8.

   Goal 8: Develop a Global Partnership for Development.

The first seven goals are mutually reinforcing and are directed at reducing poverty in all its forms. The last goal – global partnership for development – is about the means to achieve the first seven. To track the progress in achieving the MDGs a framework of targets and indicators is developed. This framework includes 18 targets and 48 indicators enabling the ongoing monitoring of the progress that is reported on annually.

Land management covers all activities associated with the management of land and natural resources that are required to fulfill political and social objectives and achieve sustainable development. Land management requires inter-disciplinary skills that include technical, natural, and social sciences. The operational component of the land management concept is the range of land administration functions that include the areas of land tenure (securing and transferring rights in land and natural resources); land value (valuation and taxation of land and properties); land use (planning and control of the use of land and natural resources); and land development (implementing utilities, infrastructure, construction planning, and schemes for renewal and change of existing land use).

Land administration systems are the basis for conceptualizing rights, restrictions and responsibilities related to land and property. Property rights are normally concerned with ownership and tenure whereas restrictions usually control use and activities on land. Responsibilities relate more to a social, ethical commitment or attitude to environmental sustainability and good husbandry. In more generic terms, land administration is about managing the relations between people, policies and places in support of sustainability and the global agenda set by the MDGs.

Property rights

In the Western cultures it would be hard to imagine a society without having property rights as a basic driver for development and economic growth. Property is not only an economic asset. Secure property rights provide a sense of identity and belonging that goes far beyond and underpins the values of democracy and human freedom. Therefore, property rights are normally managed well in modern economies. The formalized western land registration systems are basically concerned with identification of legal rights in support of an efficient land market, while the systems do not adequately address the more informal and indigenous rights to land that is found especially in developing countries.

The year 2007 was the year where the globe became urban. More people are now living in the cities than in rural areas – while in 1950 it was less than 30 percent; today it is more than 50 percent, that is more than 3.3 billion people and one third of them are living in slums. In this perspective, it becomes urgent to focus on informal settlements and find ways and means to influence government policies and actions. This also relates to the Millennium Development Goal 7, target 11 stating that by 2020 to have improved the lives of least 100 million slum dwellers. Conventional cadastral and land registration systems focusing on land parcels and registered titles cannot supply security of the various types of tenure arrangements found within informal settlements. Innovative approaches need to be developed.

A solution to this problem may be found in the so called social tenure domain model (STDM) that is currently being developed as a tool to deal with the kind of social tenure that exist in informal settlements and also in areas based on customary tenure. While traditional cadastral and land registration systems deal with identification of properties and land parcels as a basis for securing legal rights such as title, leasehold, and easements, the STDM attempts to be able to deal more generally with the relation between objects, subjects, and the social tenure that is established between the object and subject. This would provide a tool for dealing with the range of tenures found in informal settlement and should be manageable for the local communities as well as public authorities.

Property restrictions

Rights to land and property also include the right of use. However, the right to use may be limited through public land-use regulations and restrictions, sectoral land use provisions, and various kind of private land-se regulations such as easements, covenants, etc. Many land-use rights are therefore in fact restrictions that control the possible future use of the land.

Land-use planning and restrictions are becoming increasingly important as a means to ensure effective management of land-use, provide infrastructure and services, protect and improve the urban and rural environment, prevent pollution, and pursue sustainable development. Planning and regulation of land activities crosscut tenures and the land rights they support. How these intersect is best explained by describing two conflicting points of view – the free market approach and the central planning approach.

The free market approach argues that landowners should be obligated to no one and should have complete domain over their land. In this extreme position, the government opportunity to take land (eminent domain), or restrict its use (by planning systems), or even regulate how it is used (building controls) should be non-existent or highly limited.

The central planning approach argues that the role of a democratic government includes planning and regulating land systematically for public good purposes. Regulated planning is theoretically separated from taking private land with compensation and using it for public purposes. In these jurisdictions the historical assumption that a landowner could do anything than was not expressly forbidden by planning regulations changed into the different principle that landowners could do only what was expressly allowed, everything else being forbidden.

The tension between these two points of view is especially felt by nations seeking economic security. The question however is how to balance owners’ rights with the necessity and capacity of the government to regulate land use and development for the best of the society. The answer to this is found in a country’s land policy which should set a reasonable balance between the ability of land owners to manage their land and the ability of the government to provide services and regulate growth for sustainable development. This balance is a basis for achieving sustainability and attaining the MDGs.

Property responsibilities

Property responsibilities are culturally based and relate to good husbandry. Individuals and other actors are supposed to treat land and property in a way that conform to cultural traditions and ways of good ethical behavior. This relates to what is accepted both legally and socially.

Social responsibilities of landowners have a long heritage in Europe. In Germany, for example, the Constitution is insisting on the land owner’s social role. In general, Europe is taking a comprehensive and holistic approach to land management by building integrated information and administration systems. Other regions in the world such as Australia creates separate commodities out of land, using the concept of “unbundling land rights”, and is then adapting the land administration systems to accommodate this trading of rights without any national approach.

More generally, the human kind to land relationship is dynamic and is to some extent determined by the cultural and administrative development of the country or jurisdiction.

The global agenda

The MDGs represent a wider concept or a vision for the future, where the contribution of the land professionals is central and vital. FIG (the International Federation of Surveyors), being a global NGO representing the surveying community/land professionals in more than 100 countries throughout the world, is strongly committed to the global agenda as presented in the MDGs.

Issues such as tenure security, pro-poor land management, and good governance in land administration are all key issues to be advocated in the process of contributing to the global agenda. Measures such as capacity assessment, institutional development and human resource development are all key tools in this regard. More generally, the work of the land professionals within land management forms a kind of “backbone” in society that supports social justice, economic growth, and environmental sustainability. These aspects are all key components in attaining the MDGs.

Professor Stig EnemarkFIG President, Aalborg University, Denmark