Resource information
This ADI study in collaboration with the Land Information Centre seeks to understand the relationship between land titling and poverty reduction in two sangkat of Prey Nup District, Sihanoukville Municipality. More specifically, it attempts to document the manner of landholder acquisition and the land titling process of the Land Management and Administration Project (LMAP) in four villages of the two sangkat; to examine land sales and land transfer processes before and after titling; to explore the link between land titles and access to credit; and to assess the contribution of land titles to security of land tenure and the resolution of land disputes. A survey questionnaire was conducted with 264 households in four villages of the two sangkat. In addition key informant interviews were convened with villagers, LMAP officials, and district managers of lending institutions. In the two sangkat villagers actively participated in the mapping and measurement of their lands for titling under LMAP and more than 90 percent of all agricultural plots owned by the households surveyed were titled under LMAP. This was a remarkable achievement. Land sales in the two sangkat were higher in the four and a half years since LMAP implementation than in the previous fourteen years combined. While higher land values benefited village sellers, proceeds from land sales were spent mainly on health costs and rarely invested in productive pursuits. Meanwhile, the majority of land sales after LMAP were still transacted by making sales contracts with notification at village and commune levels without processing the transfers through the Land Registry. This practice of transferring land extralegally threatened to undermine the viability of the systematic land titling program. Of note, more than 90 percent of all households surveyed had never used an LMAP title as collateral for a loan. A major benefit conferred through LMAP was the stronger tenure security on LMAP titled lands. While LMAP titling did not immediately translate into poverty reduction for most of the recipients it did constitute a contributing component of development interventions and reforms with potential for moving people out of poverty and allowing them to share more equitably in economic growth.
