Kabul : Urban Land in Crisis

Afghanistan is one of the poorest and
longest suffering countries among members of the World Bank,
and has been ravaged by chronic conflict and political
instability. Afghanistan's infrastructure has been
destroyed or degraded; its human resource base severely
depleted; and its social capital eroded. Despite existing
public administration structures, the majority of state
institutions are only beginning to function effectively, and
the economy and society have become fragmented. The purpose
of this report is to provide policy guidance to the
Government on how to manage three of the most important
aspects of urban land management: i) development of urban
areas using contemporary techniques of planning and
regulation, and ii) the regularization of tenure in informal
areas and iii) land rights dispute resolution. All three
issues are intertwined since the regularization of tenure
depends, in part, on the capacity to resolve land rights
disputes, and the implementation of a realistic and
affordable urban development plan requires a stable legal
framework to establish land use rights. The rectification of
the three issues is a necessary but not sufficient remedy
for creating well function land and housing markets, a topic
beyond the scope of this report.