$68 Million for Lamp this Fiscal Year

The Land Administration Management Programme (LAMP) in the Ministry of Agriculture and Lands, has been allocated $68 million this financial year, as set out in the 2007/08 Estimates of Expenditure, now before the House of Representatives.
According to the Estimates, the project aims to promote efficient land administration and management, and to rationalize the allocation and use of land resources in an integrated and sustainable manner, by implementing critical aspects of the National Land Policy in the areas of: land use and development; public land management; land registration; and land information management.
The project, which was implemented in April 2000, is being funded by the government of Jamaica and the Inter American Development Bank.
This year’s allocation will be used to complete tenure clarification/regularization activities; continue stakeholders meetings in Spanish Town, St. Catherine and Santa Cruz, St. Elizabeth; complete inventory of public lands and buildings for St. Catherine; document in a manual form, the process of participatory planning for Spanish Town and Santa Cruz; and continue verification of parcels clarified/regularized by the Land Management Consortium (LMC).
A number of achievements were made under the programme up to December 2005. These include the completion of terms of references for five studies for development plans for Spanish Town and Santa Cruz; approval of land use plan of Santa Cruz; and the completion of background papers on geology, geomorphology, land capabilities, wetlands, swamps, population size, density, sex ratio and housing for the Santa Cruz plan.
In addition, digital orthophoto for Kingston and St. Andrew and Port Maria were procured and delivered to the National Land Agency; and maps were procured for Spanish Town and Santa Cruz.
Also, four Global Positioning Systems (GPS) were procured and a divestment manual is now in draft format, however, new information such as joint venture partnerships will be incorporated before the manual is finalized. The data form to capture the information for the inventory of public lands and building is completed and is now in use.