THE Guyana Lands and Surveys Commission (GLSC) is spearheading several projects by natural resource agencies to ensure sustainable management and development of Guyana’s lands.
The GLSC is on a mission to improve public land administration, alleviate poverty and promote national development, according to the guidelines outlined in the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (UNSDGs).
And in this regard, on Thursday, in collaboration with the Food and Agriculture Organisation of the United Nations (UNFAO), it hosted a ‘Sensitisation and Validation Workshop on Sustainable Land Management and Development Project Concept’. The workshop, which was held at the Marriott Hotel, saw attendance by several Government ministries and organisations.
The GLSC is the guardian of public lands in Guyana and the National Focal Point Agency to the United Nations Convention to Combat Desertification (UNCCD), with an obligation of preparing “an Aligned National Action Plan to serve as the guiding framework for implementing actions to combat desertification/land degradation and promote sustainable land management.”
The workshop looked at a drafting policy to govern land use and management, and it is expected that recommendations will be made for one collective land-law document combining several land acts, as was suggested by Prime Minister, Moses Nagamootoo, in his feature address.
Sustainable Land Management International expert consultants, Sally Bunning and Emmanuel Chinyamakobvu, along with National Consultant, Joselyn Grimmond-Da Silva, made a presentation on the concept and results-framework of sustainable development and management of land in keeping with the objectives of the UNCCD.
A discussion was also held on the draft project proposal and the next step and way forward were also presented by the Project Management Department within the Ministry of the Presidency, the Ministry under whose leadership the Commission falls.
Expert Guidelines on responsible governance of land, fisheries and forests and land degradation assessment in drylands, and a world overview of conversation approaches and technologies tools for land degradation and sustainable land assessment and mapping were also presented by the FAO experts.
The Commission has partnered with the UNFAO to implement a Sustainable Land Development and Management Project.
Meanwhile, in brief remarks during the opening ceremony, Commissioner of Lands and Surveys Commission (GL&SC), Trevor Benn, explained that the Commission is dedicated to working diligently in fulfilling its mandate. This includes maximising access to land, undertaking and regulating surveys, providing information and managing public lands in accordance with the principles of transparency, accountability, equity and sustainability, and to support national development and poverty reduction.
The Commission serves a diverse clientele, which includes Government ministries, private investors and financial institutions and has established offices in eight of Guyana’s 10 administrative regions.
THREATENED
Benn said that while Guyana is endowed with fertile agricultural lands, diversified mineral deposits, and an abundance of tropical rain forests, its natural resources are threatened by a developing pattern of land degradation, a problem which can restrain ecosystem services and functions if it is not addressed.
“We have however been observing over the years the expansion of land-based investments, forestry, agriculture and mining that have been plagued with issues of overlapping conflicts; this coupled with a lack of comprehensive baseline information and analyses, the lack of a monitoring and management frameworks, as well as the none existence of land use and management policy that enable land mapping, classification, land use planning and registration to be done simultaneously, remains a major setback.”
As interests increases in the exploitation of natural resources, and there continues to be an increase also in coastal erosion’ land degradation in Guyana is expected to increasingly occur with a potential to expand at a rate corresponding to the increase in such exploitations of resources.
“Given the observed rapid upsurge in economic activity over the last few years, marked with the increased demand for State land leases for agriculture, mining, logging, settlement expansion; it is expected that land degradation would continue to be a challenge. This conclusion is supported by the global datasets obtained from the international monitoring agencies and national data. The data also shows that the increase is in part due to land clearance,” Benn explained.
The Sustainable Land Management and Development Project which will be undertaken by the Commission and FAO, is expected to address and correct the absence of the relevant land use planning and land management policy, lack of technical interventions and definitive measures to promote sustainable land management and utilisation.
Benn said the project intends to promote good environmental stewardship in a green economy to achieve a better quality of life; improve planning, monitoring and evaluation capacities to address land management needs; improve standard of living through sustainable land use and management practices; strengthen monitoring and enforcement capacity and ensure compliance with sustainable land management practices; mainstream policy and implementation by natural resource agencies and; implement sustainable land development and management and monitoring, using indicators for the reduction of land use conflicts and innovative problem solving initiatives.
“It is also expected to increase land reclamation of degraded public lands and reduce degraded areas in relation to total land area,” Benn said.
