Ibadan Journal of the Social Sciences
Volume 19, No. 1, 2021
DOI: 10.36108/ijss/1202.91.0110
Access to Land for Sustainable National Development: Land Delivery Channels and Tenure Security Institutions in Benin City, Nigeria
Justin E. Agheyisi
Department of Geography and Regional Planning, University of Benin, Nigeria
Abstract
It is increasingly being recognized that secure tenure is the bedrock of sustainable development. Used as one of the indicators for measuring progress in development goals, secure tenure forms the basic framework for assessing sustainable human settlements’ development since its adoption in the 1996 Istanbul Declaration. Since secure land tenure has been recognized to reduce poverty, land conflicts and guarantee property inheritance, it, therefore, forms part of an integrated development approach of the Post-2015 Development Agenda in the context of human settlements. This article, therefore, examines the place of access to land and tenure security in the context of sustainable development with a particular focus on neo-customary land delivery systems and tenure security institutions that underpinned tenure rights in Benin City. Through focus group discussions (FGDs) with key actors and semi-structured interviews of resident home-owners, the customary process and institutions that guaranteed tenure security were identified. The study reveals a number of key tenure security issues in the neo-customary land delivery systems which show that though neo-customary land delivery channels increase access to land, sustainable development will be compromised as long as the customary institutions cannot guarantee secure tenure, particularly for the urban poor.
Keywords: CDA, Community, Neo-customary, Development, Informal