The additional financing would support expansion of the scope of activities under the current World Bank Land Registration and Cadastre System Project and support implementation for an additional three years
WASHINGTON, February 21, 2012 – The Board of Executive Directors of the World Bank has approved additional financing in the amount of USD 10 million for the Tajikistan Land Registration and Cadastre System for Sustainable Agriculture Project. The additional financing of the project will support three major aspects of Tajikistan’s reform agenda for land and immovable property. It will contribute to expanding farmland restructuring and the issuance of land use-rights certificates to farmers, support the development of a cadastral system with spatial data about properties, and develop a set of pilot activities and plans for the development of a future immovable property registration system in Tajikistan. The additional financing will help to create the enabling conditions for private sector-led development in agriculture and other sectors of the economy.
Throughout the three years of the project’s extension under the additional financing, actions will be taken to build understanding on how to improve the immovable property registry system by testing and demonstrating the integration of registry and cadastral information and good customer service in selected areas, and supporting analysis and planning for their expansion to the national level. The project will further expand farmland restructuring and issuance of certificates for family farms, and expand the issuance of use rights certificates for other types of immovable property. It will also include support for the activities that complement farmland restructuring and certificate issuance, including information for farmers and other immovable property users. Grants for on-farm irrigation rehabilitation, and environmental land management, also comprise an important aspect of the additional financing.
Since its inception in October of 2005, the project has achieved a number of important results. So far, the project has been responsible for the issuance of over 37,500 land use certificates for family and individual farms, out of about 50,000 issued throughout the country. Seven Regional Land and Cadastral Centers have been put into operation, and a geodetic reference network has been developed for use for the legal cadastre system. The project has fostered a number of policy reforms, including initiatives related to farm debt resolution, spatial data availability, and the decentralization of certificate issuance, and has also built awareness of other key land policy issues. The project has also financed 60 grants to Water User Associations to support on-farm irrigation rehabilitation investments on 10,700 ha in 23 districts, involving nearly 23,000 land use certificate shareholders. In addition, over 132,000 people have been educated about the meaning of land use rights and the process of restructuring large government-managed farms into family and individual holdings. The project has also supported a large-scale publicity campaign and technical training.
The Tajikistan Land Registration and Cadastre System Project is currently financed by a USD 20.39 million grant from the International Development Agency (IDA) arm of the World Bank Group, which includes a contribution of USD 90,000 from the Government of Tajikistan, and USD 330,000 worth of contributions from the beneficiaries of the project.
The active portfolio of the World Bank in Tajikistan currently consists of 14 projects with net commitment of US$ 192 million covering energy and water (35%), agriculture and rural development (31 percent), education, health and social protection (30 percent), and economic policy and public sector (4 percent).
