Documente Academic
Documente Profesional
Documente Cultură
submitted 2011-02-28
Abstract
Nowadays data users desire to access and see land data on the computer screen
wherever and whenever they turn on their computer. However, administration of
Real property information is one of the major challenges in most of African countries.
The administration of land data is not satisfactory but also it takes too long to access
or updates land records in Tanzania. Tanzania has witnessed a massive violation of
land data. The accuracy of lands information is increasing questionable in recently
years. Land data insecurity is an outcome of lack of defined and adequate system for
protecting, sharing and distribution of land information. Lack of recognized and
scalable land information network across the country has weakened a lot on
provision of good governance in Tanzania. Too many constraints on the existing
manual lands information management system cause a number of chaos and
injustice to stakeholders, Such as; Unnecessary queuing for public services, data
lost or misplaced, documents forgery, corruption for service, increase of
unnecessary bureaucracy and service delay. This research addresses the needs for
the Government to consider dilemma on the existing land information as an obstacle
not only to the good governance also to the social and economic development of the
country. The country needs to move now than later from the use of manual land
information system to a networked information system which integrated title
registration and geospatial data into common system.
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Article under Review for the International Journal of Spatial Data Infrastructures Research,
submitted 2011-02-28
1. INTRODUCTION
There three land divisions working under the ministry of land, which are, division of
survey and mapping, urban development and land development. The operations of
land divisions are interdependent to each other as detailed in Figure.1. Urban
development division deals with land use planning and monitoring of land use
development. Survey and mapping division deals with land survey activities and
management of national topographical map. Land development division under
commissioner of land deals with title registration and land dispute management. Title
Article under Review for the International Journal of Spatial Data Infrastructures Research,
submitted 2011-02-28
document can not legally recognize until registered by registrar of title. Figure1.
Shows land registration process in Tanzania.
Survey Request
Assistance land
Commissioner for Commissioner
Land
Certificate of
Right of
Title Registration,
Occupancy
Property Tax and Land
Rent Information
If Title YES
Signed
Registrar of
Title
No
Return to
TP drawing and Applicant
Approval of land
use Development
YES
Is proposed No
URBAN DIVISION Municipal development
Planner conformity with
Town Plan Information
Resources plans?
Article under Review for the International Journal of Spatial Data Infrastructures Research,
submitted 2011-02-28
According to Tanzania land law (1999) all land is public, vested in the president as
trustee to own all land on behalf of the public. This implies that, no individual own
land but right of occupancy. The president can acquire any parcel of land for public
interest. However the public interest has not been specified in the law.
Lands information is significant and valuable asset which need to be recognized and
accessible to varieties of user over complex network infrastructures. The land
delivery information flow in Tanzania has been cleared demonstrated in figure 1. The
main land data sources are cadastre survey, town muster plan and title registration
and land use development data. Cadastre survey information are processed and
managed by survey division. Land use development records, title registration data,
land rent data and property tax data kept by land use division under commissioner
for land. Registry office keeps records regarding with certificate of occupancy
registration. However each land division keeps records independent from each other.
Unfortunately the cadastral survey system in Tanzania is not pleasing at all. Large
part of the Tanzania is not surveyed due to number of factors including weakness in
the existing land survey system. According to Kombe and Kreibich (2001), two thirds
of urban housing in Tanzania has to be classified as informal settlement.
That mean most of the lands information are not known, which leads to a fast
growing of unplanned settlement (squatter) and environmental pollution. One things
that affect spatial data acquisition and processing in Tanzania are unnecessary
bureaucratic and too many steps involved in land survey as demonstrated in Table 1.
However, today, fifty one years after national independence Tanzania still relaying
on manual file base information system. Land file has to move manual from one land
office to another, from municipality to regional or zone office, from regional office to
ministry of land. The paper based information system is not only outdated but costly
and ineffectively. The existing land information system has negatively impacted on
land delivery process. A title registration process which can be completed in less
than one hundred days it take up to 8 (eight) years to grant certificate of occupancy
to an applicant. According to Mollel and Lugoe (2007), the human factor is a major
source of conflicts especially when speed of work, access to records and decision-
making is taken to attract corruption. A human factor can always play tricks to bring
in the wrong or right file depending on the capacity to manipulate the system.
One of the weaknesses of manual file based system is file lost and misallocations of
land records within Government land office. There an argument that files
misallocation and document lost are done intentionally by government officials so as
to make thing complicated and therefore to attract corruption.
There a limited chance for the existing land information system to identify frauds,
mistake or errors done by land officer. Some government officers who are in titled to
enforce land laws are intentional do forge or manipulate land records.. Apparently,
the Dar es Salaam regional commissioner intervened Kinondoni municipal land office
to discover land document forgery and abuse of the office authority.
Land information security risks are another problem which affects the land delivery
process in Tanzania. There two types of risks available, which are, Physical risks
and technological risks. Physical risks includes any man made effort to destruct,
forge or any misuse of land data, such as, document forgery, fire risks and file lost.
Technological risks are those risks associated with the use of digital technology such
as, data change in a server model, an unauthorized access to land information
resources, system collapse and poor quality of land data.
However, some people within the Government land authorities taking advantage of
current land information system, and they will do whatever it takes to stop or
discourage any initiative to re-modify the current land information system.
Article under Review for the International Journal of Spatial Data Infrastructures Research,
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iii. Boundaries disputes are common in rural and urban areas. Underutilization
of geospatial technologies such as remote sensing and GIS technologies
resulted to too many land boundary conflicts between inhabitants. There
many evidence proving that GIS is affordable and suitable technology to
handle parcel data. Eagleson(2003) demonstrate deeply on how to apply GIS
technology in boundary administration.
v. Unnecessary Delay of town planning (TP) drawing and land use plan
approval is another chaos to member of public. That caused by too much
relaying on paper base information system. It does not make sense at all to
take more than a month just to approval land use plan proposal.
Article under Review for the International Journal of Spatial Data Infrastructures Research,
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ix. Limited access by land stakeholders to land data. There is no a defined land
information sharing mechanisms. Land researchers, land owners, high court,
land tribunals, and many other of land data users are facing extra difficulties
on accessing land data. Data access limitation are not only affecting land
delivery process but also affecting other economic and social development
activities such as, limit the use of property as collateral to secure financial
assistance and delay of property development activities.
Standards
Network
Land Stakeholders
Data
Security Risks
(Peoples) Legal & Policy
Frameworks
Article under Review for the International Journal of Spatial Data Infrastructures Research,
submitted 2011-02-28
Land data stakeholders categorised into three groups; the first group is land data
handling machinery consist of departments dealing with acquisition, processing and
distribution of land records, normally are Governments agents. The qualities and
accessibility of land data depend much on the effectiveness of the land data
management machinery. A second category comprising remote data user whos their
decisions relay on land records from recognised government authorities. Users who
fall under this category include financial institutions, estate developer, researchers,
Land dispute resolution organisations, planner, weather institutions and land
surveyor and security forces. This group need a soft mechanism that allow them to
access and verify land data from land departments regardless of their location. The
last categories of land data stakeholders are users from different location of the
world whom do access land data for different purpose. Comprise known, unknown
Article under Review for the International Journal of Spatial Data Infrastructures Research,
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and illegal users such as, travellers, tourists, terrorists, transportation and
environment agents.
Figure 3: illustrate some of potential land data stakeholder in Tanzania
Researchers,
Tanzania Land Owners Travellers&Investor Tanzania Postal
Investment centre
Office
Weather
Infrastructures Authorities
developer Tourism Environmental
Industry agents
Databank
As discussed before analogy cadastral survey methods are machinery for geospatial
data acquisition and processing in Tanzania. However, there many evidence from
previous research proving that the existing cadastral survey system in Tanzania has
failure to provide expected outcome. The quantity, speed and distribution of
geospatial information are not adequate at all. That is why large part of the countrys
lands is neither surveyed nor planned.
Tanzania is not an island to isolate herself from the increasing demand to establish
National geospatial data infrastructure (NGDI). The Government should realise the
importance of NGDI /NSDI and start investing on human resource, technology and
regal frameworks so as to be capable to develop a sustainable spatial data
infrastructure.
Security, security and security (SSS) are important component of land information
system. First; security provide data confidentiality, secondly; security protect land
data from attacks and violations and thirdly; security technology can rescue system
Article under Review for the International Journal of Spatial Data Infrastructures Research,
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from collapse or link failure. Moreover, access to land data should be limited based
on the status and type of users. In other word user should be categorised into status
and each category should only access specific authorised land resources. Security
risks become higher as the network expand, the bigger the network the higher the
data risks. Peoples should be aware that, land information are not free from denial of
service attack, man in the middle attacker and massage sniffer.
6. CONCLUSION
Demand for electronic national land information system is higher than it thought. The
price of continuous using file base information system to manage land records is
higher than many peoples can imagine. Scalable land information system is an
enabler of many social and economic development activities in the country. The
Government officers and politicians should not take advantage of the existing weak
land information system to benefits themselves, lather they should take serious
initiative to establish a scalable network system which can meet demand of varieties
of land stakeholders in the country and beyond.
ACKNOWLEDGEMENT
It is a pleasure to thank those who made this project possible such as my parents,
who gave me the moral support I required.
Lastly, I would like to thank the almighty God, for giving me the strength and good
health during all the time of the project.
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