Presented at the Country Learning Exchange held during the 7th GLTN Partners Meeting 2018 in Nairobi, Kenya.

1. Nepal
ADDRESSING LAND ISSUES IN NEPAL:
DEVELOPING LAND POLICY AND FIT FOR PURPOSE
LAND ADMINISTRATION STRATEGY
Ganesh Prasad Bhatta
Director General, Survey Department, Nepal
Ministry of Agriculture, Land Management and Cooperatives, Nepal
National Reconstruction Authority, Nepal
Community Self Reliance Centre (CSRC), Nepal
Human Rights Awareness and Development Centre (HURADEC), Nepal
Kadaster International, The Netherlands
UN-Habitat, Country office Nepal
UN-Habitat, Land and GLTN Unit Nairobi
Tuesday 24th April 2018

2. GLTN BRIEFING AND PROGRAMME
INTRODUCTION
• Mountainous Country in the Himalayas
• 28 Million population; nearly equal number
of land parcels
• 2/3rd population engaged in agriculture;
contribution to GDP 1/3rd
• About 45% of rural Households landless or near
landless owning less than 0.5 ha
• No official record of landless and informal tenure
holders
• Constitution of Nepal (2015)
• Federal Democratic Republic
• Safe housing right, Land to SED people, Land
Reform, Land Use Planning, Gender
Responsive-ness, Good Governance
• Mega Earthquake of 2015
• Nearly 900,000 houses fully or partially
destroyed
• Some 500 Villages feared vulnerable for
relocation
• “Build Back Better” approach for housing
reconstruction and rehabilitation

3. GLTN BRIEFING AND PROGRAMME
KEY LAND CHALLENGES
• Implementing land reform, and pro-poor and
gender responsive provisions of Constitution of
Nepal
• Restructuring land administration and
management authority as distributed into
Federal Structure (Federation, Provincial and
Local)
• Security of tenure for informal settlers and
shack dwellers
• Land management and rehabilitation of
earthquake victims within the “Build Back
Better” Framework
• Access to land or secured tenure
• Relocation from vulnerable sites
• Integrated Settlement Planning

4. GLTN BRIEFING AND PROGRAMME
KEY INTERVENTIONS
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•[Photo 2]
•[Photo 1]

5. GLTN BRIEFING AND PROGRAMME
KEY INTERVENTIONS
•[Insert]
•[Photo 2]
•[Photo 1]

6. GLTN BRIEFING AND PROGRAMME
PARTNERSHIPS
•Ministry of Agriculture, Land Management and Cooperatives: Lead land
policy formulation
•National Reconstruction Authority and its local office: Coordination in post
earthquake disaster rehabilitation and reconstruction, policy improvement,
infrastructure development
•Department of Survey and its local district office, Dolakha: Test
Implementation of FFPLA using low cost QGIS/ STDM based LIS system
•Kadaster International: Technical and Financial Support in implementing
participatory enumeration and STDM in post earthquake land and tenure
management
•Community Self Reliance Centre (CSRC): Study of tenure typology,
support multi-stakeholder consultations in land policy development and
designing FFPLA Strategy
•Human Rights Awareness and Development Centre (HURADEC): Data
collection, local coordination and STDM analysis in post earthquake land
and tenure management
•Community members, ward leaders, Mayors, all government bodies,
especially the survey department, Caritas provided the information and gave
their trust to Huradec

7. GLTN BRIEFING AND PROGRAMME
PROCESSES
•[Key processes involved – graphic will be good]

8. GLTN BRIEFING AND PROGRAMME
PROCESSES
•[Key processes involved – graphic will be good]

9. GLTN BRIEFING AND PROGRAMME
KEY ACHIEVEMENTS
•Land Policy Document
•FFPLA Strategy to implement
the land policy in the post EQ
Disaster and post-Constitution
• FFPLA interventions: Customized STDM in Open Source
QGIS platform
• Less financial burden compared to proprietary: No SW licensing cost
• Time to transform is not a problem: Imported ½ Million Parcels from
Arc Shape files to STDM in 12 days
• Equally efficient: Parcels splitting, Map printing, Field Book/ Plot
Register copy, Survey and database creation services delivered with
no less quality
• Necessary equipment, manuals and training support provided

10. GLTN BRIEFING AND PROGRAMME
KEY ACHIEVEMENTS
• NRA recognized and owned the achievements
• Relocation Plan of Boshimpa/ Panipokhari approved
• Integrated Settlement Plan of Jilu approved
• Relocation Plan of Bulungkhani under consideration
• Land and Tenure status for informal tenure holders in Phulappa
identified
• The government knows where the people are, the people know where the
government is and what the government is doing for them
• Participatory Enumeration process for Formal and Informal tenures
using satellite imagery and hand held GPS developed
• Customized STDM tool developed for houses and farm information
• Open Source based STDM LIS for a Survey Office service delivery
started
• Capacity Development (Training, Workshop, Seminar, Symposium)
• National dialogue platform on land issues activated; Partnership and
Mutual trust between different land stakeholders created

11. GLTN BRIEFING AND PROGRAMME
EMERGING OUTCOMES
• Land Policy recognizes security of tenure of informal and
customary land holdings
• FFPLA Strategy clearly defines methodology and processes to
address challenges in legal, institutional and spatial framework in
implementing the land policy in the country context.
• Transformation of Survey Office LIS tested
• from a commercial SW based platform to a Open Source QGIS based
system STDM
• Housing support agencies come to work in FFPLA approach
• Caritas in Bulungkhani (Approx USD 0.15 M Housing reconstruction
cost committed by Carita Nepal)
• NRA has accepted additional support in infrastructure development
in land management
• Approx USD 0.7 M Infrastructure cost committed by NRA for Jilu,
Approx USD 0.65 M Infrastructure cost committed by NRA for
Panipokhari/ Boshimpa

12. GLTN BRIEFING AND PROGRAMME
LESSONS LEARNED
• Stakeholder Needs, Government priority and UNDAF
Framework as a common area of partnership is
foundation for successful cooperation
• With defined Objectives, processes and stakeholders
the land projects are not difficult to materialize
• Persuasive and Multi stakeholders engagement
(Experts, Civil Society, Academia) works well
• Partnership (UN, CSO, Government, Academia, NGO/
INGOs) brings together multi-faceted knowledge and
expertise
• Foundation for further work has been created, which
needs further strengthening

13. GLTN BRIEFING AND PROGRAMME
ACTION PLAN
• More Engaged Dialogue
• Making Policy Makers Internalize the benefits of FFPLA, STDM
• Efforts on Capacity Development / Enhancement
• Municipalities (Rural/Urban) (753) (to deal with land related activities)
• Land Administration Institutions (in changed context)
• Reengineering Land Administration System
• Improving LA services in line with FFPLA Strategy (STDM),
• Open Source LIS scaled up to all service units in line with FFPLA
• Devolve LA services in all local and provincial govt. units (753+7)
• Data Collection (IVR) of all informal tenure holders
• Covering approx. 25% of arable land in the country using Participatory
enumeration and STDM methods
• Support Land Use Planning of all the municipalities (753)
• Collaborate with development partners
• to fill the financial gap / technical support

14. Nepal
ADDRESSING LAND ISSUES IN NEPAL:
DEVELOPING LAND POLICY AND FIT FOR PURPOSE
LAND ADMINISTRATION STRATEGY
Ganesh Prasad Bhatta
Director General, Survey Department, Nepal
Ministry of Agriculture, Land Management and Cooperatives, Nepal
National Reconstruction Authority, Nepal
Community Self Reliance Centre (CSRC), Nepal
Human Rights Awareness and Development Centre (HURADEC), Nepal
Kadaster International, The Netherlands
UN-Habitat, Country office Nepal
UN-Habitat, Land and GLTN Unit Nairobi
Tuesday 24th April 2018
THANK YOU!