Land information management in Ghana, as in many developing countries, remains a practice monopolised by public sector land administration agencies, which are known for being inefficient in delivering services that satisfy the needs of citizens. Under this monopolised regime, landed property related data gathering, processing through land registration, storage and dissemination of the information as final product for public use is entirely based on expert knowledge. Meanwhile, reliance on this kind of knowledge for land information management has continuously failed to promote smooth flow and a broad based access to reliable information for decision making by citizens. This failure has created a huge land information gap between market participants’ especially genuine and fraudulent landed property owners on one hand and potential buyers, lenders, and investors on the other hand. Thus, there is information asymmetry, which this study identifies as a major contributory factor to the challenges of uncertainties and high transaction costs that characterise dealings in urban real estate markets in Ghana. In order to verify how the information gap can be closed, this research adopts quantitative research methodology. The research mainly explores multinomial logistic regression model to test Economic Theory of Knowledge propounded by Hayek (1945) using Ghana as the context of study. Primary data was collected from potential land information suppliers within the private sector and existing users of land information as likely beneficiaries of an efficient land information management regime. Interrater agreement index and Pearson’s bivariate correlation analysis were used to analyse primary data gathered from users of land information in relation to land information needs and competition in land information harnessing. Following verification of the relationship between competition and economic knowledge, the key research finding is that there are two kinds of land information management knowledge and these are expert and entrepreneurial land information management knowledge. Thus, the research presents empirical evidence that out of four types of entrepreneurial knowledge verified, two types namely adaptive and cost-efficient knowledge are most likely to influence competition in land information supply. Also, competition is likely to deliver land information services that satisfy the needs of users of land information. Altogether, the research findings converge with the theory verified. The research outcome suggests that deregulation of state monopoly of land information harnessing for competition among private economic actors in Ghana is due. Removing this barrier is likely to promote dynamic competition in which licensed land information suppliers can use adaptive and cost efficient knowledge in gathering and disseminating land information at competitive prices. The study also provides evidence that all-in-one land information, which is broadly accessible at competitive prices is likely to be required to help address the problem of information asymmetry in the context of Ghana. For purposes of practice in the context of urban real estate markets in Ghana, a framework based on the research findings is developed and validated. The framework is proposed to inform policy decision on deregulation for competition in land information harnessing to enable the real estate sector function well. To kick start the process, deregulation in land data gathering and dissemination of land information is suggested.

This study develops a basis for a land information system for the 40 ha subtropical highland catchment of Wang Jia, Yunnan Province, China. Information, including meteorology, geology, geomorphology, biology, pedology and crop productivity, was integrated using a geomorphopedological approach and expressed as maps using GIS. The developed protocol is proposed as a generic system, applicable to agricultural land evaluation in subtropical highland catchments. The results demonstrate that Wang Jia Catchment is relatively representative of the region, in terms of geomorphological features and land cover. Catchment soils, developed from residual, colluvial and alluvial materials of sandstone, shale and dolomite on different landscapes, were still young and strongly influenced by their geological parent material. Soils were normally slightly acidic to neutral. Soil fertility varied from poor to very fertile. Maize yield was significantly correlated with soil pH, total N, available N, P and K and thus the Soil Fertility Index. In 2002, maize yield was significantly correlated with manure and urea applications. There was considerable potential to increase maize yield with modified and innovative cropping practices in the catchment. Adopted primarily as a soil conservation practice, contour cultivation did not increase maize yield compared to downslope cultivation. Polythene mulch tended to increase maize yield in most years. These results largely accord with the results from controlled research plots in the same catchment. Analysis of intra-plot variations showed that soil samples from planting pits had higher total soil organic matter, total N, available N, available P and available K than inter-row samples, but with higher standard deviations. Most soil fertility parameters for inter-row samples were more similar to traditional random composite samples. These results suggest if composite samples were taken only from inter-rows, the results would have been similar, but the risk of sampling error would have been reduced. The land information system established in this study is suitable for designing, evaluating and monitoring sustainable agricultural practices central to soil conservation and crop yield improvement and thus contributing to decision-making for sustainable agricultural land management in this region.

Cadastral reinstatement methods within Queensland involve the use of modern digital surveying techniques in combination with traditional non-digital methods of recording and reporting information. This leads to the need to manually enter and re-enter data into a digital format at different stages of a survey. The requirement to lodge survey information with government organisations in a non-digital survey plan format also forces a break in digital data flow throughout the cadastral surveying system, which can only be updated by changes in the lodgement regulations. The private cadastral organisations are predominantly responsible for carrying out the cadastral surveys and the government agencies are primarily responsible for the examination, verification and administration of the cadastral data. These organisations will have no communication link for digital cadastral data until the introduction of digital data lodgement. The digital system within the private cadastral surveying organisations can therefore be considered to be an independent system with consideration needed to be given to the future introduction of a digital lodgement system at some undefined time in the future. Cadastral surveyors hold large amounts of digital information that is suitable for digital reinstatement systems. This information, if appropriately archived and distributed, has the capacity to meet the needs of reinstatement systems including as an alternative source of digital information that will eventually be obtained from digital lodgement systems. The existing technology and the private organisation structures are capable of supporting continuous digital data flow and automated systems. This research proposes a process of development for private cadastral organisations to advance from traditional systems to continuous digital data flow and automated processes within their cadastral reinstatement systems. The development process is linked to existing legislation and technology taking into consideration likely future directions. The current legislative and technological environments within Queensland allow for development towards automated digital systems that will enhance most current cadastral reinstatement systems.

La gestion des villes d’Afrique de l’Ouest pose problème à la période contemporaine : extension urbaine non maitrisée, services de base insuffisants, insécurité foncière. À travers l’aide internationale, d’importantes réformes visant à améliorer son efficacité ont pourtant été mises en place, mais elles semblent avoir été inefficaces. Dépassant ce constat d’échec, la thèse vise à comprendre comment se déroule l’acte de gérer la ville dans les circonstances particulières des villes d’Afrique de l’Ouest. La mise en œuvre du Registre foncier urbain (RFU), système d’information foncière municipal multi-fonctions introduit au Bénin à travers des programmes de développement au début des années 1990, constitue le prisme à travers lequel la gestion urbaine est analysée. Celle-ci est ainsi approchée par les actes plutôt que par les discours. S’appuyant sur une démarche socio-anthropologique, la mise en œuvre de l’instrument est analysée depuis le point de vue des acteurs locaux et selon une double grille de lecture : d’une part, il s’agit de saisir les logiques de l’appropriation locale dont le RFU a fait l’objet au sein des administrations; d’autre part, il s’agit de comprendre son interaction avec le territoire, notamment avec les dynamiques complexes d’accès au sol et de sécurisation foncière. Une étude de cas multiple a été menée dans trois communes : Cotonou, Porto-Novo et Bohicon. Deux ensembles de conclusions en découlent. Tout d’abord, le RFU s’est imposé comme l’instrument pivot de la fiscalité locale, mais est mis en œuvre de manière minimale. Ce fonctionnement particulier est une adaptation optimale à un contexte fait de rivalités professionnelles au sein d’administrations cloisonnées, d’enjeux politico-financiers liés aux différentes sources de revenus communaux et de tensions politico-institutionnelles liées à une décentralisation tardive. Les impacts du RFU en termes de développement des compétences professionnelles nationales sont insuffisants pour réformer la gestion urbaine depuis l’intérieur de l’administration municipale. Ensuite, alors qu’il vise à centraliser l’information sur les propriétaires présumés de la terre, le RFU se heurte à la marchandisation de cette information et à la territorialisation de la régulation foncière. La mise en œuvre du RFU s’en trouve affectée de deux manières : d’une part, elle s’insère dans ces circuits marchands de l’information foncière, avec cependant peu de succès ; d’autre part, elle a un impact différencié selon les territoires de la régulation foncière. En définitive, l’acte de gérer la ville au Bénin n’est pas devenu automatique avec l’introduction d’instruments comme le RFU. La municipalité se repose plutôt sur les piliers classiques de l’action publique, l’administration et le politique, pour gérer la ville plurielle de manière différenciée. À l’endroit des concepteurs d’action publique, cette thèse plaide pour une prise en compte des modes de régulation existant dans les sociétés africaines, fussent-ils pluriels, reconnaissant les voies originales que prend la construction des institutions en Afrique. / The management of West African cities is problematic nowadays: uncontrolled urban sprawl, insufficient basic services, and land insecurity. Yet, major reforms had been put in place with the assistance of international aid to enhance the effectiveness of urban management; which seems to have failed. Going beyond this policy failure statement, the present dissertation aims at understanding how “managing the city” takes place in the particular context of West Africa. The implementation of the Urban Land Registry (RFU), a municipal and multi-purpose land information system that has been put in place in Benin through development programmes in the early 1990s, is the lens through which urban management is examined. Urban management is then studied through the actions taken rather than through the discourses. With a socio-anthropological approach, the implementation of the instrument is analysed from the stakeholders’ perspectives and according to a double analysis grid. On the one hand, the analysis aims at understanding the local appropriation of the RFU inside public administrations; and on the other hand, its aims at comprehending the interaction of the RFU with the territory, in particular with the complex dynamics of access to the land and land security. A multiple case study was conducted in three municipalities: Cotonou, Porto-Novo, and Bohicon. This study led to two main conclusions. First, the RFU is recognized as the key instrument of local taxation, but it is minimally implemented. This particular functioning is an optimal adaptation to a context made of: 1) professional rivalries in a compartmentalized administration, 2) political and financial stakes related to different sources of local revenues, and 3) political and institutional tensions provoked by the late decentralisation. Then, the RFU’s impacts in terms of national professional capacities are insufficient to reform urban management from inside municipal administration. Second, a key function of the RFU that is centralizing information on presumed landowners is impeded by the commodification of land information and by the territorialisation of land regulatory modes. This affects the implementation of the RFU as it takes part in this land information market, but with little success; and its impact is differentiated according to the ‘land regulation territory’ it applies. Finally, ‘managing the city’ in Benin is not an automatic task, even with the introduction of management instruments such as the RFU. Administration and politics continue to shape municipal policies, and the pluralistic city is managed in a differentiated manner. To the designers of public action (policies), this dissertation encourages to take into account existing regulation modes in African societies, even if they are multiple and complex, and it recognises the singular process of institution building in Africa.

Cette thèse se demande en quoi les demandes de relocalisation alimentaire contribuent à transformer la gestion de l’accès au foncier agricole. Plus largement, il s’agit de comprendre comment le partage des terres entre les personnes souhaitant y avoir accès prend en compte la diversité des modèles agricoles et alimentaires. Le corpus étudié se compose de mobilisations de terre pour une agriculture nourricière de proximité, qui sont menées par des acteurs publics locaux, le mouvement Terre de Liens et des agriculteurs. Leur analyse est réalisée de manière croisée, à partir d’enquêtes conduites dans trois zones d’étude françaises couplant ville et campagne.Le projet de relocalisation est d’abord porté par une large diversité d’exploitations. Son inscription spatiale complexe et les représentations territoriales qui y sont liées invitent à redéfinir la catégorie de "local" en matière alimentaire. Ensuite, les mobilisations de terre participent à renouveler les voies d’accès au foncier : des stratégies domaniales misent sur la mise en œuvre localisée de modes de gestion du foncier alternatifs, tandis que des stratégies réticulaires ciblent la circulation de l’information foncière. L’application du cadre des faisceaux de droits foncier permet d’analyser les réajustements des limites respectives de la propriété et de l’usage de la terre. Enfin, les rapports de pouvoir présidant au partage du foncier, qui font notamment intervenir les Safer et les représentants de la profession agricole, ne sont modifiés qu’à la marge. Au-delà de rares cas de gouvernance de la coexistence foncière des modèles agricoles, la thèse indique comment comprendre l’objet d’étude depuis une perspective de justice foncière. / This dissertation focuses on how the rise of local food issues impacts the way access to farmland is managed in France. This question fits into a a broader concern about how processes of allocation of land take into account the diversity of agricultural models. My corpus is made up of case studies of land operations benefiting a relocalized agriculture and carried out by local public authorities,the civic movement Terre de Liens and farmers. I study them through a cross analysis of surveys undertaken in three regions associating a city and the surrounding countryside : the Ami´enois, the Lyonnais and the south-east of the Aveyron departement.Fist, the relocalization project appears to be implemented in a wide variety of farms. Its complex spatial scope and the related social representations call for a renewed definition of the ”food localness” category. Second, the land operations help renewing the means of accessing farmland. Estate strategies rely on setting up alternative farmland management styles at a local scale, whereas network strategies target land information flows. Building on a bundle of rights framework, the dissertation analyses how the demarcartion between property and use of the land evolves. Third, the power relationships governing the allocation of land are only incrementally modified, as the Safer and traditional farmers’ unions remain at the center. Beyond scarce cases of governance of the land-based coexistence of agricultural models, the dissertation build up a land justice frameworksuited to France.

科学研究費補助金 研究種目:基盤研究(B)(2) 課題番号:08455251 研究代表者:福和 伸夫 研究期間:1996-1998年度