The National Agency for Sustainable Land Management and Land Use Monitoring Hosts a Meeting with World Bank Representatives
The parties discussed primary strategies for enhancing agricultural land management and monitoring within the sub-component of the “Georgian Resilient Agriculture, Irrigation, and Land Project (GRAIL).” Meeting participants included Giorgi Misheladze, Chairman of the National Agency for Sustainable Land Management and Land Use Monitoring; Ranu Sinha, Irrigation and Drainage Specialist at the World Bank; and World Bank experts Anna Corsi, who specializes in land administration, and Zdravko Galic, who focuses on information technologies. Richard Grover, a land valuation expert, delivered a presentation remotely on land evaluation criteria.
The sub-component aimed at strengthening agricultural land management and monitoring seeks to enhance the capacities of the National Agency for Sustainable Land Management and Land Use Monitoring. These enhancements include developing and implementing a land information system, introducing a methodology for the mass assessment of agricultural land at the national level, developing a sustainable land management strategy, and preparing and piloting a national land consolidation strategy. Representatives from the World Bank familiarized themselves with the agency's processes for land inventory and decoding, as well as its technical capabilities.
At the meeting, the focus was on the process of creating a unified geodatabase for land use and land cover, as well as developing a land information system using geoinformation technologies. This development draws on global best practices and EU directives. It was noted that the tasks assigned to the National Agency for Sustainable Land Management and Land Use Monitoring had not been undertaken by any institution since Georgia's independence. Previously, these tasks were only partially carried out, resulting in a lack of existing experience in this area.
The agricultural land management and monitoring strengthening sub-component of the “Georgia Resilient Agriculture, Irrigation, and Land Project (GRAIL)” is valued at 14 million USD, with equal financing from the World Bank and the state budget of Georgia. The implementation of this project will contribute to the development of land management and the agricultural land market, as well as establish a solid foundation for an efficient land use system.
