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The Global Land Tool Network (GLTN) is now preparing to bring the validated Costing and Financing of Land Administration Services (CoFLAS) tool into a new phase, piloting at country level. FIG, its membership and the corps of volunteers that were involved in this tool development over the past three years are immensely privileged to have been able to contribute towards conceptualising and designing this land tool, one within the suite of 18 land tools embedded in five overarching themes envisaged by GLTN to bring about improved efficiency and effectiveness to land administration and management towards securing land and property rights for all.â©
CoFLAS is a collaborative initiative of the GLTN, which is a partner of FIG facilitated by the United Nations Human Settlement Programme (UN-Habitat) and working from Nairobi, Kenya. The initiative aimed to develop a tool that could assist policymakers and those responsible for land administration to adopt appropriate technologies and methodologies that will provide and sustain land administration services more efficiently and effectively, with options appropriately tailored for varying tenure types.â©
In developing this tool, partners and stakeholders involved had to consider the social fabric of land tenure, concentrated investigations on the various cost elements, methods of land administration service delivery and alternative means of financing such services from possible or alternate revenue streams. The tool is not intended to provide a single solution, but instead describe a range or ranges of options that can be appropriately adopted as well as the ability to enhance or increment as required according to the laws, policies and institutional arrangements of the particular jurisdiction. The tool should guide decision makers through appropriate and incremental processes towards improving efficiencies with good practices and budgetary options, but without compromising the quality of services provided, nor limiting access to services especially for the poor and the vulnerable. â©
CoFLAS focuses on the cost of developing and maintaining a land administration service (LAS) and the likely return from LAS. A key initiative that underpins the approach adopted in developing CoFLAS is the concept of âFit For Purposeâ. The FIG/World Bank Declaration on Fit-for-Purpose Land Administration provides a framework for getting the right data and information, the right processes and technologies, all for the right purposes, recognising that there is an urgent need to build cost-effective and sustainable systems that identify the way land is occupied and used, and accordingly provide for secure land and property rights. â©
The development of CoFLAS started in 2011 with a review, investigation and preliminary report prepared by Lantmäteriat. Two expert group meetings (EGMs) were convened in 2013 that brought together global experiences of land administration reform professionals to understand, in particular, information that was required and to chart the process forward. The first EGM was facilitated by Kadaster International in Rotterdam, Netherlands on 16-17 May 2013, the second by Lantmäteriat in Gävle, Sweden on 14-15 October 2013. The EGMs were convened to gather and share global experiences and practices in support of this tool development and to ensure that the information collected would be structured in a manner that can be applied in a global manner under a very broad range of legal, institutional, and administrative contexts. â©
Launchâ©
This CoFLAS tool was launched during the XXV FIG Congress in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, in June 2014. The launch triggered a need for a validation exercise. A validation workshop was convened by FIG and GLTN in Bangkok, Thailand on October 15-16. This again gathered a group of land administration professionals of varied experiences, who assessed the sufficiency of the current version (now referred as CoFLAS I) and identified gaps and shortcomings. The workshop also analysed the challenges and opportunities before CoFLAS I and made recommendations whereby the tool can be taken to the next level in its development.â©
Jurisdictions need to plan for the longer term as any LAS reform typically involves significant effort and resources over many years. This CoFLAS tool can be applied by developing countries to assess the likely scope and cost of establishing a LAS with broad geographic cover and of providing ongoing LAS.
