Ines AissaniIt is certainly the best-known and most widely reported blockchain application: that of land registry and land in general.
We know how thorny the land issue is in Africa and for many countries on the continent, it is a real headache.
This is also what explains why the enthusiasm around blockchain to solve land registry problems is so intense.
Succeed where governments have failed?
This is not about suing governments. We are sufficiently familiar with African history to know that the obstacles to development are located at several levels and have several sources, often independent of governments.
No, what we want to show when we say "succeeding where the State has failed" is rather the fact that the blockchain seems to have much more impact than anything that has been known so far.
This article is here to prove it.
First, let's clarify what we're talking about. Blockchain technology, in short, is a system that allows all kinds of defined operations to be recorded in a large digital register.
Thus, in the Bitcoin blockchain – the most notorious of all blockchains – all financial transactions of sending and receiving bitcoin are recorded.
The blockchain is in principle inviolable and transparent in the sense that everyone can consult the data recorded in the blockchain. Likewise, it is impossible to falsify any recorded data because this technology runs in a decentralized manner with several computers linked to each other. Therefore, to modify the smallest piece of data, more than the majority of computers would have to work together to modify a piece of data. Technically, it is very difficult and in terms of energy, it would be titanic.
Finally, we can already see here, if only in the simplified description of the blockchain, how it could overcome many problems, particularly land.
A practical case in Ghana: BitLand
Obviously, it is in Ghana that we will see the first example of a blockchain application to resolve the flaws in the Ghanaian land register.
This project is led by a young entrepreneur, Naigamba Mwinsuubo who founded the company BitLand. It is still considered a pilot project, as this technology is still in its infancy.
BitLand allows private individuals who wish to do so to survey their territories which will be recorded on a blockchain.
On the one hand, many city dwellers still do not have a physical postal address, for the simple reason that they are often located in lands that have not yet been mapped.
On the other hand, from a purely legal point of view, the land tenure regime suffers from clarity and modernity.
Many people fear being dispossessed of their land. Trust in a shaky system has many harmful consequences for the general economy of a country. How to apply for a bank loan for the acquisition of a property if it risks being bequeathed to another person?
The entire real estate investment sector is being deprived of growth.
These are the real difficulties of the land situation in Africa and Ghana. This is also why blockchain seems to be the appropriate solution for this type of problem.
Concretely, what solutions?
Yes, we are now curious and right to wonder concretely how blockchain could solve the problems of African land register. So let's get to the point.
Remember that in Ghana, more than 90% of rural areas are not yet listed. That is to say, they do not yet exist from a cadastral point of view. These are lands not registered in state administration.
So, what blockchain could bring to the Ghanaian land register is, on the one hand, the possibility of registering land on a huge register. Then, the property titles can be registered on the blockchain without any possibility of tampering with this information.
Let us take a digression here to recall the extent to which the questioning of property titles too often ends up in the courts as there are so many falsifications...
Blockchain innovation would then make it possible to digitize the land register to offer a long-lasting and stable system. We will be able to trace each transaction to find out who the real owner is. No need for a paper land title, everything will be recorded in the blockchain. No more need for extreme falsification, since the Blokchain prevents any fraud...
Land tenure institutions will be streamlined and all support will finally be digital.
A pilot project followed by other African countries?
This is indeed the most relevant question to ask. Will there be other initiatives like this? In Africa and perhaps even in Europe, although in Europe, the question will be just as delicate to the extent that the land register is already digitized. The bridge will perhaps and probably be easier to cross.
However, whether in Africa or in the most developed countries, implementation will not be easy because it fundamentally remains a new and complex technology.
Generally speaking, we now feel the need to support projects like BitLand. It is necessary that more and more information circulates about the possibilities of blockchain and that more and more entrepreneurs seize the opportunity to solve development problems with this formidable technology.
