FG Moves to Make Land Assets Economically Viable, Set to Grow Titling to 50%

•Dangiwa says more than 90% of land in Nigeria unregistered

Emmanuel Addeh in Abuja

The Ministry of Housing and Urban Development and the World Bank Group yesterday resolved to work together towards addressing the 90 per cent of land in Nigeria that is unregistered and untitled.

The move, the ministry said, is aimed at making the nation’s vast land assets more economically viable and unlocking the over $300 billion in dead capital tied up in such undocumented land.

This was the outcome of a visit on the Minister of Housing and Urban Development,  Ahmed Dangiwa by a delegation of the World Bank led by its Vice President (Infrastructure), Guangzhe Chen in Abuja.

One of the areas of the collaboration agreed on during the meeting, according to a statement, was  the National Land Registration and Titling Programme in partnership with the state governments.

“This is very important to our government as over 90 per cent of land in our country is unregistered and untitled. Experts estimate a dead capital of over $300 billion.

“Through this initiative that we plan to implement with the World Bank, we aim to, amongst other objectives, register, document and title all land parcels within five years; develop and launch a National Digital Land Information System (NDLIS) and define a framework that makes it accessible to all stakeholders.

“We will further increase the formalisation of land transactions from less than 10 per cent to over 50 per cent in the next 10 years and train and deploy technically competent land registration officers nationwide,” he said.

The minister added that land registration and titling will open up sources of revenue for the states which can boost their income through ground rent, Certificates of Occupancy, and taxes accruing from increased investments in real estate.

He further said that such funds can be used to provide urban services in the states which can help minimise the effect of climate change across cities in Nigeria.

He added: “We have examples from states which have implemented proper land registration systems using Geographic Information Systems (GIS). Kaduna and Nasarawa are two good examples. These states have not only been able to significantly improve land registrations, but have also generated huge revenues in the process,”

Addressing the issue of Urban Liveability, which he said is another area of common interest, Dangiwa noted that implementation of the approved National Urban Development Policy was a key priority of the administration of President Bola Tinubu.

“We have to create the necessary frameworks towards an effective, impactful and sustainable implementation towards improving the management of our urban areas and improving service delivery, saying that the World Bank’s Technical Capacity in the area will be highly needed.

“The third focus area is the development of a framework towards addressing the systemic barriers along the housing value chain. Doing this will help us to enhance private, affordable housing investments,” he added.

Citing the recent flooding in Maiduguri which left more than 200,000 people displaced, the minister said the need to invest in urban resilience had become more evident in recent times following rapid climate change and the susceptibility of many Nigerian urban centres to its impact.

Speaking earlier, the World Bank Vice President of Infrastructure,  Chen, said the purpose of the visit was to identify areas of common interests which they can prioritise in their collaboration with the ministry.

He disclosed that the Bank was open to supporting Nigeria on land administration, affordable housing, sustainable financing mechanisms, addressing the impact of climate change on the urban sector, and engaging in urban land management towards the attainment of liveable cities, digitisation, among others

“We have developed some models and worked with some countries in West and Central Africa on urban liveability and resilience, and these models can be reviewed and replicated in Nigeria,” he said.

 He added that the World Bank was open to providing financing and technical support to the ministry to help the government achieve its housing and urban agenda.

Also on the delegation was the Country Director of the World Bank, Ndiame Diop, who gave the assurance that the priorities outlined will be looked at by both teams, fine-tuned, and developed into comprehensive programmes.

In his closing remarks, the Permanent Secretary of the Ministry, Dr. Marcus Ogunbiyi, solicited for support from the World Bank in the area of capacity building.