[Tanzania] World Bank approves $150m to aid land systems

The World Bank has approved $150 million in financing to strengthen Tanzania’s land administration system and increase tenure security for at least two million land holders, users and their families.

The new financing from the International Development Association (IDA) is for the Land Tenure Improvement Project (LTIP) which will be implemented by the Ministry of Lands, Housing and Human Settlements Development, targeting 14 regions which cover approximately 40 districts.

The project seeks to support the issuance of one million Certificates of Right of Occupancy (CROs), 500,000 Certificates of Customary Right of Occupancy (CCROs) and one million Residential Licences (RLs).

“Tanzania is experiencing rapid urbanization with strong implications for land administration. Land disputes are increasingly becoming a common feature in both rural and urban areas,” said the World Bank country director for Tanzania, Ms Mara Warwick.

“Securing land rights and improving land management systems will enable opportunities for agricultural investment and will increase household resilience to climate change and other potential crises. This is crucial for Tanzania’s economic development and poverty reduction,” she said.

The project is expected to benefit individual and communal land holders and users, both women and men, in the targeted regions.

The project will also benefit public land sector professionals, who will gain the skills needed to support land administration.

In the long term, beneficiaries will also include the public and the private sector who can use the data gathered for improved planning and investment. The government will benefit from increased tax revenues and other forms of land related revenue generation to fund the land administration system.

“The focus on capacity building and institutional strengthening for the land sector is consistent with global lessons that shows that if the land administration system is not affordable, accessible, and agile, people will not use these services and the transactions will be done informally, quickly making the property data out of date,” said Victoria Stanley, World Bank senior land administration specialist and co-task team leader for the LTIP.

LTIP will contribute to predictable policies and transparent processes and procedures, which are key for successful private sector investment, such as the systematic registration of land rights and basic land administration system infrastructure. Specific activities financed under the LTIP include those which increase tenure security as well as also those supporting land information management such as the upscaling of the Integrated Land Management Information System (ILMIS) and property valuation systems. LTIP will also finance the physical development of land offices and infrastructure, as well as support land and housing tribunals.

Recent World Bank analysis identified gender constraints in agriculture include weaker access to land by women. While most Tanzanians, both men and women, lack formal documentation to their land and property, men are more than three times as likely as women to claim to be the sole owners of land or property assets.

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