After four years of working towards the data collection, piloting and demonstration activities at case study locations in Rwanda, Kenya, Ethiopia, and Zanzibar, the project ‘its4land’ came to an end. In response, the European Commission Horizon 2020 project led by the University of Twente, released innovative geospatial tools to make land rights mapping faster, cheaper, easier, and more responsible.
There are millions of unrecorded land rights in sub-Saharan Africa. The results of many existing ICT-based approaches focused on land tenure recording are deviating from experts expectations. Challenges include incomplete recordation and unresolved or escalated disputes. its4land focused on how to map them faster, cheaper, easier, and more responsible.
LAND ADMINISTRATION TOOLBOX
As a result, its4land developed the so-called its4land Land Administration Toolbox which consists of tools and services for land-rights mapping. It consists of the following:
- Needs assessment
- SmartSkeMa
- UAV workflows-Orthophoto Generator
- Visible boundary delineator
- Publish and Share Platform for Land Administration Workflows
- Governance and capacity building
WHAT IS NEXT?
The project results obtained great marks from the European Commission reviewers. Therefore, new research project applications for further developments are planned. The project also received an EXIST Business Start-up Grant. The one-year support programme will help the idea based on the innovative research findings in the ‘its4land’ project to be further developed and customized to fit the current niches and to enter the commercial market.
ITS4LAND
The project consortium aimed to develop an innovative suite of land tenure recording tools inspired by geo-information technologies, that responds to end-user needs and market opportunities in sub-Saharan Africa, reinforcing an existing strategic collaboration between EU and East Africa. The project consortium of its4land is multi-sectoral, multi-national, and multidisciplinary. More information is available on the website of its4land.
