D R W . O D A M E L A R B I

TOWARDS A CREDIBLE AND EFFECTIVE LAND REGISTRATION

SYSTEM:LESSONS FROM SYSTEMATIC LAND TITLING PILOT PROJECT IN

GHANA

OUTLINE

• Background

• Deed Registration system

• Defects of the Deed Registration system

• Land Title Registration System

• Systematic approach to land titling

• Results

• Lessons learnt

• Conclusion

BACKGROUND

Land ownership in Ghana is of two broad categories: State land and customary lands in the ratio of 20%:80%

State lands are lands acquired by Government through compulsory acquisition for public purposes

State lands are spread throughout the country.

Background

• Customary lands are all the different categories of rights and interest held within traditional systems and which include stool lands, skin lands, clan lands, and family lands.

• Ownership and tenural arrangements are rooted in trusteeship and fiduciary principles

• A complex series of rights and interests exist in customary lands. These include: – Allodial interest – Customary freehold – Share cropping – Share farming – Alienation holdings – Community’s common property rights – A range of derived/secondary rights

Background

There is no land in Ghana without an owner.

Theoretically therefore it is possible to place every parcel of land on a land register and register a proprietor

DEEDS REGISTRATION

• Land registration started in 1852.

• Registration is by way of deed – the recording of instruments relating to land.

• The system has several defects: – Multiple registration of different instruments relating to the same piece

of land – Registration is not by reference to the land itself – Registration is not compulsory – Registration is not conclusive evidence of title to land

• The result is litigation, the common source of which is the absence of documentary proof of rights and interests in land.

SOME CHALLENGES OF THE EXISTING SYSTEM

Recordings are done at the background of plain sheets

The recordings sometimes overlapped as a result of human factors

LAND TITLE REGISTRATION

• Land title registration was introduced in 1986 to provide a more authoritative means of facilitating the proof of title, and to render dealings in land safe, simple and cheap.

• Registrable rights and interests under the law include – Allodial title – Customary law freehold – Common law freehold – Leasehold – Customary tenancies

• It is expected that each parcel would be registered under at lease one of these registrable rights

• Even though the legal framework provided for a compulsory system of registration, the practice has been sporadic, and demand-driven

CHALLENGES OF THE EXISTING SYSTEM

• Sporadic, demand-led approach which has made it very difficult to have a complete record of parcels within a declared registration district.

• Even though the entire Greater Accra Region has been declared land title registration district there is less than 50% registered parcels in each district over 25 years of title registration.

• Conversion from deeds registration to title registration was not possible due to different levels of accuracy of parcel plan for title registration as against the plan in deeds

• The system is associated with long delays and frustrating processes and procedures leading to loss of public confidence in the system.

SYSTEMATIC APPROACH TO TITLING

• A new approach to land titling was piloted under the Land Administration Project I

• Objective of the pilot was to accelerate systematic land title registration processes by the application of section by section, block by block, parcel by parcel and one parcel-one visit principle

• All relevant information required for issuing land title is to be captured on a single visit to the property

Systematic Approach to Land Titling - Methodology

• Identify and measure the boundaries of parcels within the sectional map including the determination of the extent of the property boundaries as indicated in sectional maps provided as against the area occupied on the ground.

• Obtain relevant land information relating to parcels – type and characteristics of buildings, utilities availability, occupier/owners and any other data using a designed questionnaire.

• Administer land title registration forms and initiate the land title registration process.

Systematic Approach to Land Titling - Methodology

• Assignment should be undertaken in metric system, using WGS84 and UTM Projection

• All the parcels in the project area were to be measured in order to capture geometric data of parcels and buildings. All measurements were to be checked independently, for instance by tape between two vertices or by superimposition on a recent digital orthophoto or the digital photogrammetric vector map, made available by the Survey Department.

• All permanent buildings within a property were to be numbered, measured, digitally photographed and classified. If the roof-print of a building was recognizable on the digital vector map, its footprint should not be measured.

Systematic Approach to Land Titling - Methodology

• All parcels including roads, open spaces, water bodies and all other polygonic land forms were to be numbered using a format provided by the Ministry

• Owners of adjoining properties were to be identified to ensure their participation in fixing of boundaries.

• Standard Land Title Registration forms were to be used to collect specific information to be used by the LTR (particulars of the proclaimed owner/lessee and take photocopies as provided by the land owner or a digital photograph of the documentary root of the claim, if there is one)

• Digital Plan Table (DPT) equipment and Penmap Software was provided by the Project for data capture on the field.

The Results

• 100% target was achieved in the surveying of the parcels

• A new Geodetic Reference Network using WGS 84 and UTM has been used in establishing a geodatabase

• Less than 50% of the parcels surveyed have been titled

• A comprehensive training and capacity has been built for private surveyors in the use of DPT

• Data collected showed marked differences between office records and grounds facts

THE RESULTS

Parcel plans delivered

PILOT LOCATION

ESTIMATED NO OF PARCELS

NO OF PARCELS DELIVERED

REMARKS

Osu 1158 1233

Kaneshie I 1313 1572

Kaneshie II 1574 1623

Dansoman I 1350 2438

Dansoman II 2006 1993

W. Cantonments 292 381

Danyame/Ridge 540 626

Patase/Suntreso 1700 1986

TOTAL 9933 11852

DATABASE WAS DESIGNED TO FACILITATE DATA COLLECTION AND STORAGE

Coordinates are indicated on the parcel plan

IMPORTANCE OF LIS

It encourages a systematic approach for the collection of data.

It can reduce the overall costs and institutional overlap of information collection and management. Cheaper long term cost of information management

It increases comparability and compatibility of diverse datasets.

It facilitates the accessibility of land information to users.

It encourages the spatial analysis of environmental impacts that would otherwise be ignored because of analytical difficulty using a manual approach

Superimposing sectional plan on deeds records

IMPORTANCE OF LIS

It encourages a systematic approach for the collection of data.

It can reduce the overall costs and institutional overlap of information collection and management. Cheaper long term cost of information management

It increases comparability and compatibility of diverse datasets.

It facilitates the accessibility of land information to users.

It encourages the spatial analysis of environmental impacts that would otherwise be ignored because of analytical difficulty using a manual approach

Its possible to link a parcel with the building

LESSONS LEARNT

• Success in the mapping component of systematic titling does not

necessarily translate into issuance of titles

• The underlying land ownership and tenure arrangements are key to successful land titling operations especially in urban locations

• Technology can be used to bridge the gap between deeds registration and title registration to make conversion from deeds registration to title registration possible

• Inconsistent records reflect the challenges of registration and what it will take to rectify

• The type of projection to be used should be agreed in advance. There is a shift from UTM to Ghana Transverse Mercator (GTM) – Implications? All products in UTM will eventually have to be converted into GTM.

CONCLUSION

• Despite the potential benefits of title registration careful analysis must be made about the tenure arrangements and its potential impact on titling

• Challenges should be identified far in advance before field operations start

• Key strategic decisions must be made far in advance and agreed before implementation.

• The DPT as the field equipment and the Penmap software has revolutionized the way cadastral surveys is done in Ghana. It is efficient, effective and fast for all mapping applications.