Accra, Oct 7, GNA - Land security could only be attained through genuine titles but many land owners in the country had no documented titles to their properties.

The absence of this has resulted in many missed opportunities for investment into farming, rural employment and rural prosperity. Mr Martin Eson-Benjamin, Chief Executive Officer of the Millennium Development Authority (MiDA), said these at the first ever official presentation of land title certificates, customary tenancy and customary freehold to 103 farmers in the Awutu-Senya District in the Central region, on Wednesday in Accra. The MiDA started a study of land rights in Awutu-Senya, Kwahu North and Savelugu Nanton in 2007 and 1,350 parcels of land were surveyed to date out of an estimated figure of 2,500 in the Awutu- Senya District. Mr Eson-Benjamin said the activity which cost 5.2 million dollars, took the form of systematic land title registration within the Awutu Senya Pilot registration district and the subsequent extension to other zones.

He also mentioned clearing of backlog of land cases in designated circuit courts in the MiDA districts and a public education programme to educate beneficiary communities on the benefits of land title certificate exercise. Mr Eson-Benjamin said "the model we have witnessed in the Awutu-Senya District makes us very confident that we can move to other areas covered by the MCA programme and other parts of the country to survey and issue certificates". He said the land title registry at Winneba had been completed and may be commissioned soon after which recourse to the Cape Coast regional office for registration would stop.

Mrs Jolyne Sanjak from the Millennium Challenge Corporation of the United States of America said the activity was part of a larger 547 million programme between the MCC of the US and the Ghana government. She said the programme being implemented by MiDA was dedicated to poverty reduction through agricultural transformation and MiDA's concrete support for agricultural development in Ghana among others. Mrs Sanjak said MiDA "will continue to ensure that all affected people and communities are engaged in the sensitisation, land rights identification, land survey and the registration process".

The Authority played a role in the adoption of Legislative Instrument 1914 by Parliament to declare the Awutu Senya District as a pilot registration area in accordance with the provision of the land title registration law, PNDC 152.