Access to land in Uganda’s informal settlements

Most urban households in the developing world live in informal settlements. Up to 85 percent of new housing is produced informally, a trend that is especially pronounced in sub-Saharan Africa. Land delivery processes in Uganda’s informal settlements are regulated by both formal and informal institutions.

Whilst most landowners would like to use formal mechanisms such as land registration, these processes are too expensive for lower income groups. Research from the University of Birmingham, in the UK, investigates how non-state institutions underpin and regulate land delivery processes in three informal settlements within Kampala, Uganda. Land delivery processes include land rights acquisition, transfer, sub-division, transaction and the management of relations between actors involved in these processes.

With a population of more than 1.2 million, Kampala houses more than 39 percent of the country’s urban population. Around 70 percent live in informal settlements. The research divides the land access process into four stages: obtaining information on rights availability; negotiation of a land transaction; plot adjudication and demarcation; and evidencing land rights transfer.

Data from three case study settlements– Kamwokya 11, Mbuya 1 and Busega – reveals:

• Friends, neighbours and relatives are the main source of information about plot availability in all three settlements.
• Most land negotiations are carried out between landholders and prospective buyers, although land agents (referred to as ‘brokers’) sometimes act as a link between the two parties.
• Key factors influencing the price of land include the plot size and location, whether the land is ‘wet’ or ‘dry’, the existence or absence of a registered certificate of title, neighbourhood characteristics, and the quality of available infrastructure and social services. 
• Clan identity is less influential than it used to be. 
• In Kamwokya and Mbuya most plots are demarcated by the seller but in Busega more than half of all plots are demarcated by professional surveyors.
• In Kamwokya and Mbuya most land transfers are evidenced by a ‘letter of agreement’; in Busega most landholders obtain registered certificates of title.

Most landholders would like to register their land but the process is lengthy and expensive. Many plots in informal settlements also fail to meet official standards of size and accessibility.

The study shows that land delivery processes in informal settlements draw from both formal rules and customary practises. Their success is due to high levels of trust and social legitimacy. At times, land purchasers use formal symbols to reinforce informal institutions – for example hiring a professional surveyor to demarcate their land, even though they do not complete the lengthy and expensive registration process. The research also demonstrates that formal and informal institutions are closely linked. Local councils and other formal actors constantly use both formal and informal processes.

The research concludes that policymakers should:

• explore how the formal system can learn from informal processes of land delivery
• recognise the role local councils play in informal land access processes and consider the possibility of enhancing their contribution
• recognise that residents of informal settlements cannot afford the complicated and expensive land registration process, and that they do not use informal methods out of antagonism towards, or ignorance of, state rules.

Source(s):
‘Informal mechanisms for accessing and securing urban land rights: the case of Kampala, Uganda’, Environment and Urbanization 19, by Emmanuel Nkurunziza, 2007

Funded by: Department for International Development, UK

id21 Research Highlight: 1 November 2008

Further Information:
Emmanuel Nkurunziza
Swedesurvey AB
Rwanda Land Use and Development Master plan Project
P.O Box 6799
Kigali
Rwanda

Tel: +250 0835 9993
Contact the contributor: Emmanuel.Nkurunziza@swedesurvey.se

Swedesurvey AB, Rwanda Land Use and Development Master plan Project, Rwanda

Other related links:
'Does informal housing land delivery work for urban poor people?'

'Can urban poor people benefit from land titling?'

'Land reform in Zimbabwe: a cure for poverty?'

'Customary land delivery practices in African urban areas'