Date
2022-04
Authors
Ayamena, Hans Tino Mpenya
Journal Title
Journal ISSN
Volume Title
Publisher
African Economic Research Consortium
Abstract
Human actions are the major causes of environmental changes and land seems to
be the common element in all human activities. The main objective of this work
is to study the data and stakes related to land issues in Cameroon. Specifically, it
entails (1) carrying out an inventory of socio-economic data on issues related to
land; (2) identifying the possibility of cross-matching between these databases
and with other sources of data; and (3) making suggestions that could enable
a better understanding of stakes and an improvement of land data collection
and management. The methodology used consists in document analysis and
nterviews with public and private institutions involved in these issues. In Cameroon,
it can be observed that, in the household surveys (ECAM 1, 2, 3 and 4) conducted
by the National Institute of Statistics (NIS), the agriculture and rural development
component includes land-related issues. The nation-wide scope of these surveys
and their comparability make it possible for information from ECAM databases to
be cross-matched with that from other data sources. A better understanding of the
stakes inherent to land certainly requires a cross disciplinary approach which brings
together environmental sciences, economic sciences, legal sciences, and practitioners
drawn from the Ministries in charge land tenure, agriculture, and protection of the
environment. Given the shortcomings of the current land laws, it is necessary that they
be reformed. A unified approach of data collection in which the different ministries
concerned with land issues are included in the designing of questionnaires for socio economic surveys, would contribute in improving the quality of information available
on land. Improving the internal system for the management and processing of data
from different ministries involved in land management, may equally help in improving
the collection of socio-economic land data.
Description
Keywords
Land, human actions, cross disciplinary, socio-economic data