Land tax has long been neglected in West Africa and is regarded as a taboo subject. Yet contrary to received wisdom it is possible to introduce a basic annual land tax without a land register or a computerized system. While certain precautions need to be taken, it not only generates revenue for the locality but also discourages the unproductive retention of unused land, and in the long term helps secure the land rights of producers or residents by proving written proof of their occupancy.

Looks at land tax, land expropriation, foreign ownership, the National Resettlement Programme and the Affirmative Action Loan Scheme, case studies, and donor support in the land-reform process. Concludes with recommendations on expropriation, farm workers, sustainability of resettlement projects, gender issues, skills sharing and training.

Het Interdepartementale Beleidsonderzoek (IBO) Agrosector heeft behoefte aan inzicht in de werking van de fiscale faciliteiten voor de agrosector en in de effecten van mogelijke aanpassingen daarvan. Doelstelling van dit project is om de IBO-werkgroep Agrosector inzicht te bieden in de effecten van het draaien aan knoppen van de fiscale regelingen, met name het afschaffen ervan. Door dit inzicht is de werkgroep beter in staat om onderbouwde beleidsaanbevelingen te doen.

In dit rapport wordt een zestal voor de agrarische sector relevante vrijstellingen in artikel 15, eerste lid van de Wet op belastingen van Rechtsverkeer (WBR) geëvalueerd. De vrijstellingen zorgen ervoor dat de aankoop van landbouwgrond onder bepaalde voorwaarden onbelast is met 6% overdrachtsbelasting. In de evaluatie wordt per vrijstelling onderzocht of de regeling op een doeltreffende en doelmatige manier leidt tot het bereiken van de geformuleerde doelstellingen. Daarnaast wordt aandacht besteed aan de neveneffecten van de regeling.

The paper addresses the issue of dissatisfaction related to spatial management in rural areas illustrated with an example of southern Poland. In this region, the spatial structure of rural areas is poor, which results, e.g., from substantial fragmentation and scattering of land. Additionally, the Land and Property Register, also known as the real property cadastre for the area is not up to date, and fails to meet social expectations, in particular those regarding the ownership title.

This paper discusses contradiction between theoretical preferences for using land as an object of taxation and modest revenues collected through property taxes imposed on agricultural and forest land. The paper starts with a summary of specificities of the land as an object of the property tax; then, classical economists’ preferences for the wide use of the land tax are confronted with the comparative research finding numerous examples of exemptions and favorable treatment enjoyed by agricultural and forest land.

Agricultural land is one of the most valuable natural resources which can be found in Latvia, since agricultural land has long time served as an important resource of economic activity and food production. Efficient use of this valuable resource depends not only on technologies and knowledge at disposal of farmers but also on regulations concerning the real estate market and taxation of the real estate. Recent changes of the real estate market regulation as concerns agricultural land are analysed in this paper to identify a possible influence on the use of agricultural land.

Land degradation is a topical issue not only in Latvia, but also in Europe. Even the real estate additional tax rate of 1.5% does not prevent agricultural land from overgrowing, and there is no other legal mechanism to control it. One of the mechanisms of prevention of land degradation process is reconstruction of drainage systems, change of worthless agricultural land (less than 25 points) to forest land or improvement and return of agricultural land (more than 25 points) to economic production.

The article analyses the dynamics of land payments in Samara region of Volga Federal district of the Russian Federation. The aim of the study is to analyse the changes of land payments (land tax and leasehold payment) from the beginning of the land reform in the time period from 1992 to 2014, which could be divided into the following periods: formation of land payments system (1995−1998); period of slow growth of payments (1999−2002); period of rapid growth with recession and further compensation (2003−2007), and rapid sustainable growth (2008−2014).

Taking into consideration all the data of collectibility of land payments (land tax and rent), the dependence of collectibility of land payments on economic and geographical factors is analysed in municipalities of the Samara region. The factors are defined with the help of mathematical methods, which are closely associated with payments growth from the land area of a municipality and the number of residents. The dependence simulation of the level of land payments on geographical and demographic characteristics has been implemented in a municipality.

Utilised agricultural area is one of the most important natural resources in Latvia, which provides population with food and promotes the operation of agricultural companies. Unfortunately, appropriate land management is a problem for the majority of agricultural land owners, thereby adversely affecting the efficiency of resource use and increasing possibilities for the resource depletion. Constantly new solutions are searched for in Latvia to avert inefficient use of utilised agricultural areas and reduction of land as resource.

According to Italian legislation for a particular type of real property—lands/areas subject to buildability, but not yet currently buildable—there is a problem related to their “qualification”, or whether or not they must be considered buildable for the purposes of their recurrent taxation. These potentially buildable (POBU) areas, that were previously zoned as “agricultural”, have been rezoned as “general urban planning instruments/regulations” (the General Urban Development Plans or variances, which regulate land governance), whose approval path has yet to be concluded.