The Ministry of Lands and Natural Resources under the Land Administration Programme (LAP) is developing a policy to regulate survey and mapping in the country.

The sector minister, Mr. Mike Allen Hammah, who disclosed this in a speech read on his behalf at the 2012 seminar of the Land Survey Division of the Ghana Institution of Surveyors in Accra on Wednesday, said the policy was to help promote effective land administration and to a conductive environment for survey practice in the country.

The two-day seminar was on the theme, ‘Land surveying issues and challenges in Ghana; Get it right! Use the professional land surveyor’.

It was attended by over 250 surveyors across the country. Some of the topics discussed were Geospatial technology as a catalyst for national development, ‘The Ghanaian cadastre, leasehold problems and the creeping poverty trap,’ and ‘pulse! A technique for mediation in land disputes.’

As part of the programme, some surveyors and companies who have contributed to the development of the Institution were awarded.

Mr Hammah said the new policy would help address the numerous land-related disputes in the country.

The minister expressed concern about the increasing cases of land disputes in the court and advised land owner s to use qualified surveyors for the demarcation of their lands to avoid disputes.

He said the use of unprofessional surveyors brought about inaccuracies in boundary demarcation which often created land disputes.

Mr Hammah indicated that studies conducted on the use of wayside professionals by land owners indicated that their services were cheaper and appeared to be faster.

He, therefore, called on the Land Survey Division to ensure that their service is affordable to the users.

To address the challenges facing the land tenure system, Mr Hammah said the government was implementing the LAP to provide a long-term policy “which seeks to stimulate economic development, simplify the process of land acquisition in a transparent, efficient and fair manner and developing the land market and fostering prudent land management.

“No country can develop or sustain a civil society or promote economic development within its boundaries without internal confidence and public acceptance in its land rights and system of land administration,” he stated.

Mr Hammah entreated the land survey professionals to employ the use of modern equipment to reduce the cost and time in providing services to their clients, saying the industry had receive unprecedented technological advancement in recent times.

He assured the Land Survey Division that the Survey Council Bill would soon be passed into the law to help regulate the survey profession.

The President of the Land Survey Division of the Ghana Institution of Surveyors, Mr Daniel K. Kyere in his address called on the government to expedite action on the passage of the Survey Council Bill into law.

The bill, he said when passed into law, would help the association get legal backing to enable it to regulate the profession and thereby clamp down on quacks in the industry.

Mr Kyere who chaired the programme, advised the members to go by the ethics of the profession and avoid acts which would drag the name of the institution into the mud.

The Chief of Akyem Gyadam, Barima Kwasi Nketia II in his remark, expressed concern about the high cost of securing the services of surveyors.

He said survey services were confined to the cities to the detriment of the rural areas and entreated surveyors to bring their services to the doorstep of rural dwellers.

Source: The Ghanaian Times

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