Arab Land Initiative
Good land governance, functioning land administration, and protection of housing, land and property rights are critical for the social, economic, and environmental sustainability of the Arab region and for the realisation of the human rights of all women, men, and children.
The Arab Land Initiative was established in 2016 to catalyse such positive changes. Under the leadership of UN-Habitat and the Global Land Tool Network, the Initiative empowers regional land champions through coordination, collaboration, capacity, knowledge, and information sharing.
6 May 2024
New Partnership Announcement
6 May 2024
Land, Housing and Property in Jordan: A review of the legal, institutional and administrative frameworks
25 April 2024
Championing Women's Housing, Land and Property Rights in Fragile Contexts
Publications
Events
Women and land access rights in North Africa
Climate Compass Task Force Seminar Series
UN-Habitat and GLTN to participate in the Arab Ministerial Forum on Housing and Urban Development
Workshop - Advancing women’s land rights and implementing the SDGs
The Global Refugee Forum 2023, HLP side event
Workshop on the Application of Fit-For-Purpose Land Administration in the Arab Region
World Bank Land Conference 2024! Call for papers
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Share with the Arab Land Initiative documents, publications and other information that can be show-cased here. Write to unhabitat-arablandinitiative@un.org
Page under construction!
Share with the Arab Land Initiative documents, publications and other information that can be show-cased here. Write to unhabitat-arablandinitiative@un.org
The island country of Comoros, or Union of Comoros, is located in the Indian Ocean at the northern end of the Mozambique Channel, off the eastern coast of Africa. Comoros has maritime borders with Tanzania, Mozambique, Madagascar, Seychelles and Mayotte (administered by France). [6] These volcanic islands form an archipelago of just over two thousand square kilometers [5] with a population of less than a million, 30 percent of which live in urban centres. The capital and largest city is Moroni on Grande Comore Island, while Anjouan Island is the most densely populated [10].
Djibouti has an are area of 23,200 km² and is home to one million people. Around 78 percent of the population lives in urban areas, with the major concentration found in Djibouti city and other nearby urban and peri-urban areas. The remaining quarter of the population lives in rural areas and it is mostly devoted to the traditional transhumant pastoralist lifestyle.[1] Traditionally, the Afar and Issa communities are camels, goats, and sheep herders. The Afar people, primarily residing in Djibouti’s northern region, are part of a larger Afar ethnic group predominantly found in Ethiopia, while the Issa people, concentrated in the southern part of Djibouti, share ethnic ties with neighbouring Somalia.[1] Power sharing struggles between the Issas and Afars led to a civil war that ravaged
Egypt is in the northeastern corner of Africa, with the Nile River valley and delta at the heart of the country, Egypt was one of the principal civilizations of the ancient Middle East.
Urbanization is a key driver of development in Egypt, 75 per cent of the GDP is generated in urban areas and 80 per cent of the jobs are in existing cities (NUP Diagnostic report, Unpublished). Urbanization in Egypt increased from 26 per cent in 1937 to 38 per cent in 1960 and 44 per cent in 1986. This percentage fell to around 42.2 per cent in 2017, not because the Egyptian urbanization rate is declining, but rather due to the lack of a clear unified definition of urban-rural areas. In 2021, 43 per cent of Egypt’s total population lived in urban areas and cities.
Iraq is one of the easternmost countries of the Arab Region. With Baghdad as its capital city, it is bordered to the north by Turkey, to the east by Iran, to the west by Syria and Jordan, and to the south by Saudi Arabia and Kuwait.
The information contained in this page gives an overview of the Iraq land sector. More detailed information, analysis, and full references can be found in the “Iraq Legislative and Administrative Land and Property Rights Framework” report developed by UN-Habitat and the Global Land Tool Network in the context of the Arab Land Initiative.
Jordan is located in the rocky desert of the northern Arabian Peninsula. It has a land area of 88,780 Km2 and a population of 10.3 million people, 92 per cent of whom live in urban centers (Worldometer, 2021). Inhabitants are concentrated in the west, northwest, inside and around the capital Amman, while a sizeable number of people reside in the southwest along the coast of the Gulf of Aqaba (FAO, 2019). In 2020, Jordan had an annual urbanization rate of 9 percent (Worldometer 2021), compared to a rate of 3.8 percent in 2014 (Department of Statistics, Al-Fugara, Al-Shabeeb et.al., 2018). The country is divided into 12 governorates and 51 districts. The capital city is Amman.
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Share with the Arab Land Initiative documents, publications and other information that can be show-cased here. Write to unhabitat-arablandinitiative@un.org
89 percent of the 6 million inhabitants live in urban centres, mostly along the coast. 6 percent of its 10,230 Kms surface is built-up, 32 percent is agricultural, and the remain parts are covered by grass, shrubs, rocks or forest.
Traditionally considered a middle-income country, Lebanon’s economy has been declining due to the combined effects of regional conflicts, COVID-19 pandemic, and the Beirut port explosion.
Lebanon hosts more than one million Syrian refugees scattered throughout urban and rural communities, putting additional strain on the already impoverished host communities and adding to the demand for affordable housing and basic services.
The country extends over 1,759,540 km2 where more than 90% of the total land area is desert or semi-desert. Combined with the projected increase in population, this will result in a number of major challenges in the country including the provision of adequate housing, food, clean drinking water, job opportunities, health care, education, and transportation.
Page under construction!
Share with the Arab Land Initiative documents, publications and other information that can be show-cased here. Write to unhabitat-arablandinitiative@un.org
Page under construction!
Share with the Arab Land Initiative documents, publications and other information that can be show-cased here. Write to unhabitat-arablandinitiative@un.org
The Sultanate of Oman, located on the south-eastern coast of the Arabian Peninsula, borders the United Arab Emirates, Saudi Arabia and Yemen. The country is 309,500 sq km in size, with a 2,092 km long coastline, and rugged mountains in the north and south. A vast gravel desert plain covers most of the country, which experiences sandstorms and dust storms in summer, and periodic droughts, with average precipitation of 125 mm per year.
This page presents a snapshot of Oman’s land sector. Much of its content was extracted from the report Oman Land Sector Assessment, prepared by the Urban Training and Studies Institute and the Arab Land Initiative of the Global Land Tool Network [3].
Palestine, or the Occupied Palestinian Territory (OPT), is located between the Mediterranean Sea, the Jordan River and the Dead Sea. The OPT is composed of two enclaves: the West Bank, including East Jerusalem and Gaza Strip.
The information contained in this page gives an overview of the Palestine land sector. More detailed information and analysis can be found in the “Land governance and land rights in Palestine: Analysis and recommendations” report developed by UN-Habitat and the Global Land Tool Network in the context of the Arab Land Initiative.
Page under construction!
Share with the Arab Land Initiative documents, publications and other information that can be show-cased here. Write to unhabitat-arablandinitiative@un.org
Page under construction!
Share with the Arab Land Initiative documents, publications and other information that can be show-cased here. Write to unhabitat-arablandinitiative@un.org
A repository of publications, research papers, articles, and links to relevant events by the Arab Land Initiative’s partners enriches the shared knowledge. Nine newly released documents on Somalia are now ready for download!
Situated in Northeast Africa, Sudan boasts a rich historical legacy and a diverse population estimated at 46,874,204. This vast country, covering 1.88 million km², was the largest in Africa prior to South Sudan’s secession in 2011. Khartoum, the capital, lies at the confluence of the White Nile and Blue Nile, giving birth to the iconic Nile River—the lifeblood of the region.
Officially known as the Syrian Arab Republic, Syria is inhabited by over 18 million people and it borders the Mediterranean Sea to the west, Turkey to the north, Iraq to the east and southeast, Jordan to the south, and Palestine and Lebanon to the southwest. Syria’s 185,180 square kilometers.
Tunisia is a part of the Maghreb region of North Africa, bordered by Algeria to the west and southwest, Libya to the southeast, and the Mediterranean Sea to the east and north. It contains the eastern end of the Atlas Mountains and the northern reaches of the Sahara Desert, with much of its remaining territory being arable land. Most of the southern part of the country is a sandy desert, where wadis are dry for most of the year and fresh water is scarce. Tunisia also has several islands, the Djerba Island in the Gulf of Gabès being North Africa's largest island.
Page under construction!
Share with the Arab Land Initiative documents, publications and other information that can be show-cased here. Write to unhabitat-arablandinitiative@un.org
Yemen, officially the Republic of Yemen, is a country in Western Asia, situated in the southwestern corner of the Arabian Peninsula. It borders Saudi Arabia to the north, Oman to the northeast and it shares maritime borders with Eritrea, Djibouti, and Somalia.
The World Bank is an international financial institution that provides loans to developing countries for capital programs. It comprises two institutions: the International Bank for Reconstruction and Development (IBRD), and the International Development Association (IDA). The World Bank is a component of the World Bank Group (WBG), which is part of the United Nations system.The WBG comprises of three other international organizations: the International Finance Corporation (IFC), the Multilateral Investment Guarantee Agency (MIGA) and the International Centre for Settlement of Investment Disputes (ICSID).
The World Bank’s mission is ‘Working for a World Free of Poverty’.
The Annual World Bank Conference on Land and Poverty each year brings together representatives from governments, civil society, academia, the private sector and the development community to discuss issues of concern to land practitioners and policymakers worldwide. The conference aims to foster dialogue and sharing of good practices by showcasing the diversity of reforms, approaches and experiences that are being implemented in the land sector around the world
Since the inaugural meeting in 2003, the World Bank Conference has become an annual opportunity for GLTN partners to get together and share their experiences, celebrate achievements and learn from challenges encountered along the way.
The Land Portal Foundation creates, curates, and disseminates open-access land governance information by fostering an inclusive and accessible data landscape. All of our efforts are in support of our mission to INFORM people, OPEN critical data and information, and DEBATE perspectives on land. We believe that access to information is crucial for achieving good land governance and securing land rights for landless and vulnerable people.
The German Agency for International Cooperation or (GIZ) is an international enterprise owned by the German Federal Government, operating in many fields across more than 130 countries. As a federal enterprise, they support the German Government in achieving its objectives in the field of international cooperation for sustainable development. GIZ offers demand-driven, tailor-made and effective services for sustainable development. GIZ operates in many fields: economic development and employment promotion, governance and democracy, security, reconstruction, peace-building and civil conflict transformation, food security, health and basic education, environmental protection, resource conservation, and climate change mitigation.
Founded in 1989, the Lebanese Center for Policy Studies is an independently managed, non-partisan, non-profit, non-governmental think tank whose mission is to produce and advocate policies that improve governance in Lebanon and the Arab region. Currently, LCPS has six primary research and advocacy focuses: improving political representation; strengthening decentralization; advocating for a transparent oil and gas sector; supporting policies to create jobs; enhancing stability; and empowering the youth. To better inform policymaker and the wider public, LCPS has produced books, policy papers, briefs and articles on issues such as electoral laws, political parties, sectarianism, administrative reforms, rule of law, decentralization, economic growth, budget and fiscal policy, industry and trade, energy and the environment. Additionally, LCPS has provided a platform for debate by convening over 145 conferences and workshops in Beirut and various Arab capitals to address a range of national and regional issues.