Ramos seeks reform in land administration system

ENVIRONMENT Secretary Horacio Ramos stressed the need to reform the country’s land-administration system to help boost the country’s socioeconomic development.

Ramos said the government has to come up with an efficient administration and distribution of lands to alleviate poverty, citing the fact that land is a very important natural resource.

He made the call during the Land Sector Summit 2010.

Ramos said the present land administration is “messy,” characterized by land disputes, double issuance of titles and fake titles, owing to outdated and inconsistent land laws.

“Land is a very important natural resource. Under the environment of good governance and effective land- administration system, land can serve as an important asset and a catalyst for poverty reduction and economic development,” Ramos said, adding that land rights that provide security of tenure and facilitate broad private ownership will enable the society to develop land-trading practices and create land markets.

He said the government has launched the Land Administration and Management Project (LAMP), with support from the World Bank and the Australian Agency for International Development, in order to address the problem.

LAMP was implemented starting in 2001 in order to pursue strategic reforms in the land sector through an improved security of tenure and to foster an efficient land markets in the urban and rural areas in the country.

Land Management Bureau Director Allan Barcena said under the project, the government has achieved significant gains through reforms made in the key components of the land sector.

Among the achievements, he said are:

Introduction of innovations and development of technologies in land survey and titling, land valuation and land-information management, and

Improved capacity building in the land sector in terms of trainings, education, and research and development; and improved partnership with stakeholders.

Ramos said in terms of policy reforms, LAMP was responsible for the approval of the Free Patent Act on Residential Lands, or Republic Act 10023, which is expected to benefit some 39 million Filipinos occupying untitled residential lands throughout the country, as well as the passage of the Real Estate Act, which aims to professionalize the real-estate practice in the Philippines.

“I am also happy to announce that I have already approved the implementing rules of RA 10023 and the DENR administrative order on the establishment of the Center for Land Administration of the Philippines  designed to promote the use of LAMP innovations and technologies,” Ramos said.

The National Land Sector Summit was held in an effort to formulate land- administration reforms that would make the system simple and easy to grasp, transparent and accountable, fair and equitable, and efficient and sustainable.

It was participated in by civil-society groups, private sector, local government units, various agencies engaged in their particular aspects of land administration, academe and other professional organizations, partners and international donor- agencies. –Jonathan Mayuga / Correspondent, BUsinessmirror