Publication: Federal Democratic Republic of Ethiopia : Options for Strengthening Land Administration
Abstract
Over the coming decades, land policy and administration, for urban as well as rural areas, will be critical for Ethiopia's development. The vast majority of people making up the Federal Democratic Republic of Ethiopia's (FDRE) predominantly agricultural economy live in rural areas. Finally, land policies and administration can contribute significantly to the objectives of promoting gender equality and protecting vulnerable groups in Ethiopia. This report aims to assist the government of Ethiopia in improving the performance of its land administration system based on a detailed review and lessons from Ethiopia and other countries. The three key areas for improvements and options for improving the land administration system summarized in the action matrix below are the: a) legal and regulatory framework; b) administrative capacity and organizational set-up; and, based on these, c) provision of efficient, cost-effective, and sustainable land administration services and land management.
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“World Bank. 2012. Federal Democratic Republic of Ethiopia : Options for Strengthening Land Administration. © World Bank. http://hdl.handle.net/10986/2721 License: CC BY 3.0 IGO.”
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Publication Land Tenure for Social and Economic Inclusion in Yemen : Issues and Opportunities(Washington, DC, 2009-12-01)The report, Land Tenure for Social and Economic Inclusion in Yemen: Issues and Opportunities was completed in December 2009. The report addresses the problems of land ownership in Yemen and the various social and economic problems associated with the system of land ownership. Property rights under Yemeni Law are expressed both in custom and statute, but both are informed by shari a (Islamic law), which provides the basic property categories for land in Yemen. There are unfortunately no reliable official statistics for the amount of land within these categories, or how much arable land (a small percentage of total land area) falls within each. It is clear however that certain groups suffer from disadvantages in accessing land and land rights. Daughters are disadvantaged by shari a rules which limit their inheritance shares to only half that of a son. Youth, unable to inherit until the demise of their parents and lacking the capital to buy land, lack access to land and other employment opportunities, which endangers social stability. There are occupational castes (artisans) who are discriminated in land holdings and ethnic minorities, former slaves and immigrants from East Africa, who lack access to land, and especially land ownership, limiting them to the most menial labor. Amongst the recommendations the report addresses are; the law on state land and compulsory acquisition of land by the state are relatively recent and are in general in line with current best practices. There is however some fundamental problems in its legal delineation of state land. First and foremost, there is a need to provide a clearer distinction between state and communal land. 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It supports important public functions and provides access to land for the poor but is increasingly negatively affected by weak supervision and corrupt practices. Tenancies are an important means of access to land in Yemen, especially for the poor, and their relatively stable terms stable terms under customary rules have historically provided a reasonable degree of tenure security. Post-land reform issues remain a problem in the southern governorates. Improving the system for recording of land rights has been a focus of law reform discussions in Yemen in recent years. Women are clearly disadvantaged by the terms of inheritance law, and even more greatly disadvantaged by the failure in practice to realize their limited rights under that law. The situation of disadvantaged ethnic groups deserves priority attention. Their lack of secure access to land, especially owned land, is a violation of the humanitarian values of Islam and condemns them to continuing poverty. There is growing competition for land. This is driven in some parts of the country by the development of new water technologies which have enabled larger- scale cultivation and created economic opportunities. It is clear that land dispute resolution mechanisms are not functioning well.Publication Uganda - Post-Conflict Land Policy and Administration Options : The Case of Northern Uganda(World Bank, 2009-05-25)This is the second part of land studies on Northern Uganda designed to inform the Peace, Recovery and Development Plan (PRDP). This second part of the study, undertaken during the second half of 2007 in the Lango and Acholi regions, builds on the first phase conducted in 2006 in the Teso region. This second study has been designed to present a more quantitative analysis of trends on disputes and claims on land before displacement, during displacement and on return of Internally Displaced Persons (IDPs) in the greater conflict areas of Acholi and Lango regions. 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Although economic disparities, political exclusion and deprivation in the distribution of political and economic power between the northern and southern parts of then united Sudan were often tendered as the proximal causes of the conflict, at the center of the prolonged civil war was the struggle for ownership, control and use of land resources. The tool underpinning this report is the Land Governance Assessment Framework (LGAF), a diagnostic instrument for rapid evaluation of various aspects of land governance. LGAF was developed through a collaborative effort between the World Bank, Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO), UN Habitat, International Fund for Agriculture Development (IFAD), the International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI) and the African Union (AU).Publication Study on Gender Impacts of Land Titling in Post-Tsunami Aceh, Indonesia(Washington, DC, 2010)The tsunami that originated from the Indian Ocean in 2004 wreaked massive destruction, killing more than 130,000 people and displacing half a million individuals in Aceh, Indonesia. More than 800 kilometers of coastline was affected, and close to 53,795 land parcels were destroyed. The land administration system sustained significant damage because documentation of land ownership was washed away along with people's houses and other possessions in the affected communities. Physical boundary markers, including trees and fences, also disappeared. An additionally, close to one-third of the land office personnel perished. When the disaster struck, Aceh was reeling from three decades of civil strife. Five years later, in 2009, the province was still in the process of recovery not only from the devastation of the tsunami but also from years of unrest. The premise of this research study is that the gender aspects of women's access to land and property rights cannot be understood solely as an administrative or procedural issue, but should be considered a part of the broader social and cultural dimensions. These dimensions need to be understood in relation to development opportunities, constraints, and risks facing women and affecting their ability to participate in the process of reconstruction and development. Understanding the macro social and institutional processes is essential to influencing and supporting changes to enhance gender equity on land and property rights. The results of this study need to be appreciated within the following limitations: (a) it is affected by the absence of baseline information and gender-disaggregated data on land; (b) the scope of this study is limited to land and property rights only; and (c) by the time this study commenced, the Reconstruction of Aceh Land Administration System Project (RALAS) Grant had closed, and therefore the study served mainly to assess and document the experiences and lessons learned.Publication Land Redistribution in South Africa(World Bank, Washington, DC, 2012-05-28)This paper provides an overview of land reform in South Africa from 1994 to 2011, with the focus on the land redistribution. The government policies and associated implementation since 1994 have not generated expected social and economic results for a number of reasons. Even where land has been transferred, it appears to have had minimal impact on the livelihoods of beneficiaries, largely because of inappropriate project design, a lack of necessary support services and shortages of working capital, leading to widespread underutilization of land. There is no evidence to suggest that land reform has led to improvements in agricultural efficiency, income, employment or economic growth. Therefore, the current approach, based on acquisition of land through the open market, minimal support to new farmers, and bureaucratic imposition of production models loosely based on existing commercial operators, is unlikely to transform the rural economy and lift people out of poverty. The paper argues that there are two important missing aspects in the land reform program. First, there is an absence of any viable small-farmer path to development, which could enable the millions of households residing in the communal areas and on commercial farms to expand their own production and accumulate wealth and resources in an incremental manner. Making this happen would require radical restructuring of existing farm units to create family-size farms, more realistic farm planning, appropriate support from a much-reformed state agricultural service, and a much greater role for beneficiaries in the design and implementation of their own projects. Second, what is clearly missing from the governance tradition is the sustained focus on implementation, resource mobilization, and timely policy adjustment. Much more will be required for land reform program to contribute significantly to economic growth and to the redistribution of wealth and opportunities to the majority of the population.
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Publication Empowerment in Practice : From Analysis to Implementation(Washington, DC: World Bank, 2006)This book represents an effort to present an easily accessible framework to readers, especially those for whom empowerment remains a puzzling development concern, conceptually and in application. The book is divided into two parts. Part 1 explains how the empowerment framework can be used for understanding, measuring, monitoring, and operationalizing empowerment policy and practice. Part 2 presents summaries of each of the five country studies, using them to discuss how the empowerment framework can be applied in very different country and sector contexts and what lessons can be learned from these test cases. While this book can offer only a limited empirical basis for the positive association between empowerment and development outcomes, it does add to the body of work supporting the existence of such a relationship. Perhaps more importantly, it also provides a framework for future research to test the association and to prioritize practical interventions seeking to empower individuals and groups.Publication Digital Progress and Trends Report 2023(Washington, DC: World Bank, 2024-03-05)Digitalization is the transformational opportunity of our time. The digital sector has become a powerhouse of innovation, economic growth, and job creation. Value added in the IT services sector grew at 8 percent annually during 2000–22, nearly twice as fast as the global economy. Employment growth in IT services reached 7 percent annually, six times higher than total employment growth. The diffusion and adoption of digital technologies are just as critical as their invention. Digital uptake has accelerated since the COVID-19 pandemic, with 1.5 billion new internet users added from 2018 to 2022. The share of firms investing in digital solutions around the world has more than doubled from 2020 to 2022. 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The series adds to the global efforts to study the progress and trends of digitalization in two main ways: · By compiling, curating, and analyzing data from diverse sources to present a comprehensive picture of digitalization in low- and middle-income countries, including in-depth analyses on understudied topics. · By developing insights on policy opportunities, challenges, and debates and reflecting the perspectives of various stakeholders and the World Bank’s operational experiences. This report, the first in the series, aims to inform evidence-based policy making and motivate action among internal and external audiences and stakeholders. The report will bring global attention to high-performing countries that have valuable experience to share as well as to areas where efforts will need to be redoubled.Publication World Development Report 2004(World Bank, 2003)Too often, services fail poor people in access, in quality, and in affordability. But the fact that there are striking examples where basic services such as water, sanitation, health, education, and electricity do work for poor people means that governments and citizens can do a better job of providing them. Learning from success and understanding the sources of failure, this year’s World Development Report, argues that services can be improved by putting poor people at the center of service provision. How? By enabling the poor to monitor and discipline service providers, by amplifying their voice in policymaking, and by strengthening the incentives for providers to serve the poor. Freedom from illness and freedom from illiteracy are two of the most important ways poor people can escape from poverty. To achieve these goals, economic growth and financial resources are of course necessary, but they are not enough. The World Development Report provides a practical framework for making the services that contribute to human development work for poor people. With this framework, citizens, governments, and donors can take action and accelerate progress toward the common objective of poverty reduction, as specified in the Millennium Development Goals.Publication Impact Evaluation in Practice, Second Edition(Washington, DC: Inter-American Development Bank and World Bank, 2016-09-13)The second edition of the Impact Evaluation in Practice handbook is a comprehensive and accessible introduction to impact evaluation for policy makers and development practitioners. First published in 2011, it has been used widely across the development and academic communities. The book incorporates real-world examples to present practical guidelines for designing and implementing impact evaluations. Readers will gain an understanding of impact evaluations and the best ways to use them to design evidence-based policies and programs. The updated version covers the newest techniques for evaluating programs and includes state-of-the-art implementation advice, as well as an expanded set of examples and case studies that draw on recent development challenges. It also includes new material on research ethics and partnerships to conduct impact evaluation. The handbook is divided into four sections: Part One discusses what to evaluate and why; Part Two presents the main impact evaluation methods; Part Three addresses how to manage impact evaluations; Part Four reviews impact evaluation sampling and data collection. Case studies illustrate different applications of impact evaluations. The book links to complementary instructional material available online, including an applied case as well as questions and answers. The updated second edition will be a valuable resource for the international development community, universities, and policy makers looking to build better evidence around what works in development.Publication World Development Report 1984(New York: Oxford University Press, 1984)Long-term needs and sustained effort are underlying themes in this year's report. As with most of its predecessors, it is divided into two parts. The first looks at economic performance, past and prospective. The second part is this year devoted to population - the causes and consequences of rapid population growth, its link to development, why it has slowed down in some developing countries. The two parts mirror each other: economic policy and performance in the next decade will matter for population growth in the developing countries for several decades beyond. Population policy and change in the rest of this century will set the terms for the whole of development strategy in the next. In both cases, policy changes will not yield immediate benefits, but delay will reduce the room for maneuver that policy makers will have in years to come.