19 Mar 2023

Ngwaketse Land Board chairperson, Retired Major General Mashinyana has called for efficient land management systems to cater for the rising land use demand.

Speaking during a stakeholder consultative forum hosted by Ngwaketse Land Board on Saturday, Major General Mashinyana said it was important to come up with other avenues of land use such as the vertical approach for infrastructure development rather than the horizontal one.

He said land was a finite resource and yet demand was very high due to huge volumes of development in areas such as Kanye.

Such, he said it called for efficient land management systems to ensure the land maintained its value.

He said secure land tenure rights for all were essential to reduce poverty and create sustainable development, because they underpined economic development, ecological sustainability and social inclusion.

Secure land tenure rights enable people in rural and urban areas to invest in their livelihoods and their homes, Maj. Gen. Mashinyana stated.

He said multi-storey building approach should be explored as compared to the old-style of spreading buildings around a huge chunk of land, in order to save space.

Major General Mashinyana said as land custodians, they were always looking for options to curb land shortage, noting that were compelled to buy ploughing fields to allocate residential plots to address village expansions however, being mindful that food security was not affected.

He said fertile land would be gazetted and would not be used for plots allocation.

Maj. Gen. Masinyana said the demand for land use more especially residential plots land board had resorted to allocate people un-serviced land.

He challenged Batswana to fully commercialise their ploughing fields and ranches to ensure optimum benefits, critical for economic growth.

For his part, Land Board secretary, Mr Godiramang Moepeng said the organisation was facing a transition owing to the fact that districts had increased.

He said there was a need to meet with stakeholders as Botswana Power Corporation and Water Utilities Corporation, to come up with a long lasting solution to expedite service delivery. ENDS