PRIME Minister,Moses Nagamootoo,has called for the harmonisation of several laws addressing lands to be incorporated into one comprehensive legal document for the effective and sustainable management and development of lands in Guyana.
The Prime Minister made the call during an address to the ‘Sensitization and Validation Workshop of Sustainable Land Management and Development Project Concept’,hosted by the Government of Guyana in collaboration with the Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) of the United Nations (UN) and the Guyana Lands and Surveys Commission,at the Marriott Hotel in Kingston, Georgetown, Thursday.
Mr Nagamootoo explained that he read through several national legal documents and realised that more than fifteen of the Acts addressed land management in Guyana. He believes a comprehensive version of these laws is necessary through a land management commission or committee,and has advised the gathering at the workshop that they consider his recommendations in making land laws more easily understandable.
“And so one of the functions I believe should be a challenge to those in this workshop and beyond;this workshop would be to harmonise our laws, bring them together. Make Guyana appear that we have one set of laws that address our national asset which is our land resource,” Nagamootoo said.
After going through a plethora of laws,he recognized the need for the establishment of a land management commission or committee not only to oversee the sustainable management and development of lands, but also to make related laws understandable.
“I am going through the Land Registry Act, the Mining Act deals with land;the Prescriptive Title Act Position of Land deals with land;the MMA Act deals with state lands,the State Lands Act, and I could go on and I have come through about fifteen or sixteen different acts, (including) the Amerindian Act, and all of these acts are addressing land that is available in Guyana,and that should be accessed by Guyanese and others who want to use and invest on the land. But there is no one text that you could go to that has a clear delineation of land and land use and management of land to make land sustainable.”
He recalled one of the first issues the APNU+AFC government was forced to address after assuming office was that of land allocation;after several individuals along the East Coast of Demerara had quickly and illegally taken possession of vacant lands for residential purposes.He also expressed disgust at the slothful and unfair land allocation processes under the previous administration.
Guyanese,in chanting the lyrics of the country’s national anthem ‘Dear land of Guyana’,revered in emotion, and with a deep love for country, sang of Guyana being green, great and dear, and of what the country means to them, yet many have little knowledge of the land they sing about.
“… We also refer to our land as our mother, but do we know our mother? We sing to her and it would baffle us all that with the massive land space we have in Guyana,that we knew very little about the potential of our land.
This,Nagamootoo said,is because of lack of adequate national data and mapping, and has called for Guyana to adopt an open data policy which highlights the availability of land and potential for development in order to make it investor-ready. The Prime Minister recalled when he visited Mexico in the company of Minister of Governance,Raphael Trotman,that there was detailed data and mapping readily available in that country’s statistical and data department.
He said Mexicans knew their country ‘like the palm of their hands’ and recorded data for almost every inch of Mexico. “They knew which land was good for agriculture, they knew which land was good for mining, which land was good for fisheries, they knew the potential of the land and because they knew the potential of the land,the land became investor-ready.”
During discussions after the Mexico visit,Minister Trotman suggested that a National Lands Commission (NLC) be established to address such concerns. The commission will be established to highlight the potential of all lands, be it private, state owned or Amerindian settlements.
“Even when we have to map out the land, complete the surveys and do the allocation to settlements, we need to know what is the potential of the land our people will inherit, what is the potential of land that people would buy, would lease, so that we can be sure that in this mapping exercise,that we have the data that could assure us that we can take care of issues such as food security and sustainability of our scarce, limited but vast natural and national resources,” Nagamootoo told the workshop of land management and development professionals.