Land Registration and Titling from an Economist's Perspective: a Case Study in Rural Thailand

The establishment or upgrading of cadastres and land registration systems is viewed by many as an essential infrastructure investment to be considered by less developed countries. Nevertheless, while many will agree that cadastres and land registration are useful, a decision to actually invest in establishing or expanding these activities will be easier to undertake if it is demonstrated that the resulting benefits are higher than those of other public investments. The purpose of this paper, therefore, is to report the results of a recent study undertaken in rural Thailand. That study focused on the economic implications of land titling in the agricultural sector, and utilized farm level data from a sample of about 900 farmers in four Thai provinces. The methodology of the study facilitated not only an estimate of the agricultural productivity gain due to land registration and titling, but also a cost-benefit analysis demonstrating that investment in cadastres and land titling can generate very high returns.

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