Thailand’s 20 year program to title rural land (draft)

In 1982 the population of Thailand was about 48 million and there was increasing pressure on land resources. This paper describes how the Department of Lands designed and implemented a 20 year Land Titling Program (LTP) to grant secure tenure to agricultural landholders. The success of the land-titling program in Thailand has been due to a number of factors. A major factor has been the clear vision for the project, the long-term plan to achieve this vision and the commitment of RTG and the key stakeholders to project implementation. There was a strong policy, legal and institutional framework for land administration in Thailand. Thailand had a long history of land titling and a well developed legal framework that required minimal changes.