Europe and Central Asia Knowledge Brief
67 items available
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This is a regular series of notes highlighting recent analyses, good practices, and lessons learned from the development work program of the World Bank’s Europe and Central Asia Region.
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Publication
Spatial Data Infrastructure and INSPIRE
(World Bank, Washington, DC, 2012-09)Spatial Data Infrastructure (SDI) is defined as a framework of policies, institutional arrangements, technologies, data, and people that enables the sharing and effective usage of geographic information by standardizing formats and protocols for access and interoperability. The goals of SDI are to: 1) reduce duplication of efforts among governments, 2) lower costs related to geographic information while making geographic data more accessible, 3) increase the benefits of using available spatial data, and 4) establish key partnerships between states, counties, cities, academia, and the private sector. SDI should be seen as part of wider e- Government initiatives. Infrastructure for Spatial Information in the European Community (INSPIRE) is a European Union (EU) directive that came into force on May 15, 2007, binding EU members to establish a spatial data infrastructure via the Internet that facilitates the sharing of geographic information in a standardized way. INSPIRE addresses technical and nontechnical issues, ranging from standards, organizational and procedural issues, and data policies, to the creation and maintenance of electronic services. INSPIRE is a legal framework for developing SDI throughout the EU in order to facilitate interoperability, that is, the improvement and sharing of information across various levels of government in all EU countries. -
Publication
Gender and Land Administration : Issues and Responses
(World Bank, Washington, DC, 2012-06)Land rights for women are important to women's overall role in the household economy. In most Europe and Central Asia (ECA) countries, women have equal rights to land by law, but practice varies widely across the region. Improving gender outcomes in land administration is therefore related more to education and the need to change norms and habits than it is to a specific legislative problem. Access to gender-disaggregated data and the inclusion of gender-specific messages in public awareness campaigns, training, and education can have a significant impact. Simple steps to protect and promote women's property rights are easily integrated into project activities, often at low cost. Finally, more research is needed on the gender impacts of access to credit and ways to improve women's access to credit. -
Publication
Securing Property Rights and Increasing Real Estate Productivity in FYR Macedonia
(World Bank, Washington, DC, 2011-03)Before 2005, FYR Macedonia did not have a well-functioning property registration system and citizens did not have secure property rights. Since the start of the World Bank-funded Real Estate Cadastre and Registration Project (RECRP) in Macedonia in 2005, registered property transactions in the country have increased by 121 percent; there were 93,240 registered transactions in 2009 compared with 42,116 in 2005. Annual mortgages registered in the land administration system doubled from 3,000 in 2005 to more than 6,000 in 2009, demonstrating a substantial increase in the use of ownership rights as collateral. Over 30,000 mortgages have been registered since the commencement of the RECRP in FYR Macedonia. In 90 percent of registration offices in the country, the project helped reduce the time to register a sale transaction to five days or less, down from 60 days in 2004. At the end of 2009, there were 248 accredited private surveyors and 100 registered surveying companies providing services directly to citizens in FYR Macedonia, up from 14 private surveyors and no registered surveying companies at project commencement.