Cost of land survey to come down by 60 percent

THE Government is intending to lower down the costs of land survey from the current Sh. 70,000/- to Sh. 48,000/- this is a decrease of 40.1 percent. It has been learnt. The Minister for Lands, Housing and Human Settlements Professor Anna Tibaijuka said yesterday that, the government’s intention is after it has introduced a new technological network system of the land mark survey to be used in the whole country known as TAREF2011. She said that, the system to be applied is cost effective and would quicken the process of land surveying by using the state-of-the-art facility which the government has acquired as part of reform program for the land surveying in her ministry. Professor Tibaijuka said this new chage when officiating a two day meeting of the land survey stakeholders which has been organized by her ministry that started yesterday and ends today. The meeting was attended by all district and regional land officers in the country. In her speech, Professor Tibaijuka noted that the newly introduced system will enable the work of surveying to move in much quick pace than as it is currently used and will be better taking measurements in accuracy and at a high standard level. She said the technology will be operating alongside with the normal ways of land surveying work, but with the new system, this will be operating by using satellite an aspect that it will reduce to a great extent the normal costs of land surveying. She further noted that, once the costs of land surveying are reduced, land surveyors from both government and private institutions will increase the pace of land mark survey for different uses such as town planning and human settlements, plots, villages, as well as infrastructural upgrades for demarcation in mining sites. “After the land mark surveying work is complete in these areas, stakeholders and people of all walks of life will be able to use their surveyed land to do development and also to them as collaterals for acquiring loan facilities from financial institutions’ she said.

 Professor Anna Tibaijuka

 

Under this system, she further added that, the government will be able to register as many plots as it could, an aspect that it will enable the government to collect more land tax revenues from the people or institutions, she said. However, she said that, in order to reach such targets, she has directed officers in land survey departments concerned to keep on recording relevant statistical data required for their clients and if need be will be required also to issue new basic measurements whenever there will be any global technological changes like this one in place.  She reminded stakeholders that, for the last five years, her ministry had a responsibility of doing land survey and the preparations of the land maps. However, she affirmed that, within the period under review, only 10 percent of the land area in the country has so far been surveyed, an aspect which she said is a great problem in land development. She said that, the most surveyed land is in rural areas and that about 11,247 villages out of 12,000 located in the country have been surveyed. She further elaborated that, this is due to negligence shown by some district land officers who do not take care of their people’s welfare from their areas. She noted that, in order to rectify the existing situation, her ministry is underway to form a new system of land survey that will bring changes and in view of that, she will send a request to the government for approval in this 2013/14 financial year.