Phalombe, August 22, 2019: Over 3,000 families are expected to be register land parcels through Land Governance project being implemented in three districts on pilot phase.
A consortium of Oxfam in Malawi and Centre for Environmental and Advocacy are implementing “Strengthening Land Governance Systems for Smallholder Farmers in Malawi” Project in collaboration with government through Ministry of Lands, Housing and Urban Development.
Oxfam Livelihoods Resilient Manager, Steve Kuliyazi told Journalists on Wednesday at Maoni Village in the area of Senior Chief Nazombe that the project is expected to register 3,000 parcels of land in the three implementing districts of Phalombe, Kasungu and Rumphi.
He added that the project which in its third year has registered 900 parcels of land in Phalombe districts.
“The process is still on going and we are expected that by the end of the exercise 3,000 land parcels will be register and land owners will acquired valid documentation of their ownership on those piece of land dully registered,” Kuliyazi pointed out.
He said the project has carried out field adjudication and demarcation of customary land in the area of Group Village Headman Maoni in Phalombe.
“The filed adjudication and demarcation was preceded by a training of recruited short term field technical staff and Customary and Committee (CLC) members on field work including parcels adjudication and demarcation and field attribute data collection and processing of the some towards titling and registration of customary estates,” the Manager explained.
Kuliyazi said the process would empower women to secure their livelihoods which could translate to eradicating their poverty in their households.
He said the implementing agencies are drawing lessons during the pilot phase and they would be able to rectify some of the challenges being encountered in the process.
Chairperson of Maoni CLC in Phalombe, Stena Moleni commended traditional leaders for being instrumental in the implementation of the process of registering land parcels in the area.
He said sensitization meeting which were carried out before the implementation of the project helped communities to have a better understanding of the land registration concept.
“We are happy that land ownership will be consolidated in our area where communities are being empowered to own their pieces of land legally,” Moleni added.
The four year project will end mid-2020 and is funded by European Union (EU).
