Showing papers on "Leasehold estate published in 2000"

Prospects and strategies for land reform.

Abstract: Redistributive land reform may promote both equity and efficiency. Implementing such reform can be costly, however, and may not be the best way to achieve redistribution. If land redistribution is to be implemented, it should be based on a uniform land ceiling that can be exceeded if landowners are willing to pay a high enough price to do so. Owners of redistributed land should be permitted to rent out their land. Sales of redistributed land should however be restricted though not banned: sales that respect the land ceiling should permitted and a government body should be empowered to buy back land from those who need to sell. Land reform programs should be accompanied by agricultural extension and emergency income support programs. Where traditional (coercive) land reform is not possible, market-assisted reforms and tenancy reforms can be considered, but while they are easier to implement, they have important disadvantages.

More Fruitful Than the Soil: Army, Empire and the Scottish Highlands, 1715-1815

Abstract: This text analyses the origins, development and impact of British army recruiting in the Scottish Highlands from 1739 to 1815. It examines the interaction of government, landlords and tenancy with an emphasis on tenant reactions to recruiting.

Change in the Land Use System in Bhutan: Ecology, History, Culture, and Power

Abstract: In this two part analysis I attempt to answer questions with reference to historical land use and tenurial systems in Bhutan. The first part throws light on the popularly held view that land tenure in Bhutan was feudal prior to the advent of moderisation. By looking at the lived experiences of peasants in Bhutan, as human agents at the nexus of social, political, economic, and ecological forces, a nuanced and complex picture of land use systems in Bhutan emerges. I argue that in contradistinction to a feudal tenancy mode, historically land has been held in private for the most part although other arrangements existed alongside private property ownership. Monastic estates, and estates belonging to the handful of nobility were worked by tenured serfs and slaves. In part II, I have tried to build an analytical framework for an alternative explanation to feudalism in Bhutan. Rather than relying on the 'Tibetan model' and the 'empty land model' which are closely linked, I instead build a layer model for the explanation of land use systems in Bhutan. Acknowledgement and Disclaimation Professor William Burch of the School of Forestry and Environmental Studies, Yale University, provided inspiration, advise, support, and guidance. Certain names of people and places have been changed for reasons of privacy. The views expressed here are solely those of the writer. Tashi Wangchuk is a civil servant with the Nature Conservation Section, Department of Forestry Services, Ministry of Agriculture

Hong Kong and Singapore

Abstract: SOCK-YONG PHANG [*] THERE ARE MANY similarities between Hong Kong and Singapore. They have both enjoyed high rates of economic growth over the past three decades, averaging six percent a year in real terms. The two have become known as "East Asian Tigers," having made the transition from poverty to newly industrialized economies in a relatively short time. Both started off as British colonies, with British legal and administrative systems, and made their living as trading ports serving their respective regions. Singapore has been an independent republic since 1965; Hong Kong was returned to China on July 1, 1997. While Hong Kong and Singapore are now the busiest ports in the world in terms of throughput, they have divested from their reliance on trade since the 1960s, climbed the industrial ladder, and are now important international financial centers as well. Hong Kong and Singapore are both densely populated cities. Land is a scarce resource and land and property prices are high even when compared to prices in the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development countries (with the exception of Japan). "Speculating" or "investing" in the property market in both cities is indeed a favorite pastime of risk-loving locals and foreigners alike. The two cities are well known for being free traders as well as international financial centers with few restrictions on trade and capital flows, which are many times their GDP. However, what is less well known is the fact that the state owns all land in the case of Hong Kong, and four-fifths of the land in the case of Singapore. There is no hint of Henry George's distinctive methodology if one examines the technical procedures for deriving revenue from real estate in Hong Kong and Singapore. This is especially true in that no attempt is made to separate site-value from the improvements on land. The assessment systems in both cities are derived from the British rating system and are basically annual value systems. Even though Singapore and Hong Kong depart from the method of land-value taxation that George advocated, they have accomplished to a significant degree the capture of land values for the public, along with the reduction of tax burdens upon industry--which together constitute George's key policy proposal. Hong Kong and Singapore capture economic rent primarily by nationalizing land and leasing it out. In Progress and Poverty (Book VIII, chapter ii), Henry George contends that this approach is "perfectly feasible," and that it satisfies the "laws of justice" and "meets all economic requirements." However, he goes on to say that there is a "simpler, easier and quieter way," namely, to leave land in private hands while using the tax mechanism to appropriate its economic rent for public purposes. Yet, (except maybe for minor considerations of administrative efficiency) it should not be taken for granted that he necessarily considered the second way superior to the first for every situation. His statement assumes a context such as that which obtained in the US and most of the Western world both then and now, in which private property in land is the norm. Whether he would have viewed land-value taxation as superior to nationalization in contexts such as Hong Kong and Singapore, where such a high proportion of the land (not merely in area, but also in value) was public from the outset, is by no means clear. While the state is the largest landowner in Singapore and the only landowner in Hong Kong, the inefficiencies that could have resulted from state ownership have been minimized through the creation of markets for state land and property leases. Unlike the socialist city where the absence of land markets had very negative impacts on efficiency, productivity, and environmental quality, [1] property markets are active in Hong Kong and Singapore and transmit important information to both users and urban planners. Also, the public leasehold system, where the government plays a major role in land use planning and resource allocation, works in Hong Kong and Singapore because the public sector institutions in both cities are efficient and non-corrupt. …

Skills, Partnerships and Tenancy in Sri Lankan Rice Farms

Abstract: This paper examines whether sharecroppers and fixed-rent tenants in the rice farms of South Asia are distinguished by their farming skills. The idea that fixed-rent contracts are typically given to relatively skilled tenants dates back to the agricultural (tenancy) ladder hypothesis of Spillman [1919]. The screening models [e.g. Hallagan 1978] that have attempted to formalize this idea assume that landlords do not observe the tenants' skill levels. This assumption is restrictive, and has found little support in empirical studies. The principal-agent model proposed in this paper focuses on the differences between time-intensive and skill- intensive labor tasks. I show that tenancy contracts are designed to match the provision of these tasks with the owners of time and skill inputs. Sharecropping, in this model, provides an incentive scheme that allows for the specialization between a time-abundant tenant and a skill-abundant landlord. The second part of the paper empirically explores this result with household-level data from Sri Lanka. A two-stage model that distinguishes the choice of contract from the extent of land leased is used. The results clearly show that relatively skilled farmers are more likely to become fixed-rent tenants. I also find that, conditional on contract choice, farming skills do not affect the extent of land leased. A substantial part of the empirical analysis is devoted to the measurement of farming skills. I interpret farming skills as the contribution of observed farmer characteristics to the technical efficiency of the farm. This measure recognizes that many dimensions of skills are observed, and the use of weights computed from a production function to construct the skill index is theoretically more appealing than the ad hoc selection of proxy variables.

Small landowners and land distribution in iran, 1962–71

Abstract: During the Cold War years following World War II, the U.S. government and international agencies such as the World Bank and FAO strongly advocated and pushed for land reform (distribution) in countries under U.S. influence. Examples of American-sponsored land reforms included the land-distribution programs in Japan, Taiwan, South Korea, South Vietnam, Iran, the Philippines, and El Salvador. Land reform in practice consisted of giving the ownership of land to the cultivating tenants and sharecroppers. By giving land to the tenants, it was believed that a communist revolution or takeover could be avoided. The modern theoretical basis for land reform can be found in the writings of such Marxist scholars as Alain de Janvry, the non-Marxist writers Albert Berry and William Cline, and the World Bank economists Hans Binswanger and Miranda Elgins.1 Marxist writers had stressed the political aspects of “anti-feudal” reforms. Such reforms were said to promote political stability as well as strengthen capitalism. How the abrogation of private-property rights was supposed to “strengthen” capitalism was not really explained. Non-Marxist writers concentrated on increased efficiency and increased output that was expected from land redistribution. Berry and Cline showed that in labor-surplus underdeveloped dual economies with a bi-modal farm structure (where large commercial and small subsistence farms existed side by side), a land reform that redistributed land from large farms to small farms increased agricultural production and rural welfare, and brought about economic growth and development. In addition, land reform was seen to result in greater social equity (taking land from wealthy landowners and giving it to poor farmers). It was an article of faith among the proponents of land reform that “the hated class of absentee landlords” did not fulfill any useful socio-economic function, at least none that could not be performed equally well by some government agency. They also believed that sharecropping and tenancy did not fulfill any useful social and economic functions. It was implicitly assumed in the theoretical writings that the rights of a small number of individuals were to be sacrificed for the benefit of the many. In none of the theoretical literature was the possibility of expropriating a large number of individuals advocated or even considered.

The use of data from South Australia's rental tenancy tribunal for research and policy analysis: Issues of validity and efficacy

Abstract: This paper examines the value for research and policy development of rental tenancy data collected by the South Australian Rental Tenancy Tribunal (RTT). The data held by the RTT are for South Australia only, but comparable organisations exist in a number of other states, such as New South Wales and Victoria. Lessons learned from South Australia could serve as a pilot for the development of a new (semi‐) national framework for monitoring the private rental market.

Investment potential within the residential private rented sector

Abstract: The residential private rented sector (PRS) has the potential to make a significant contribution to the housing needs of the future. The PRS benefited from regulatory changes in the late 1980s that removed fetters to rent levels and tenancy length. The historic under‐investment is being re‐evaluated and the PRS is beginning to emerge as a viable corporate and institutional investment vehicle. The strategic assembly of portfolios, which may be highly specialised or more general, can be identified from published demographic forecasts. Finance for new‐build, refurbishment and bulk acquisition can be sourced from specialist residential investment funds. The overall effect of these measures is beginning to make the PRS a reinvigorated investment opportunity with long‐term potential.

Identifying Industrial Location and Site Preferences for Small Business: A South Australian Case Study

Abstract: This paper is based on a survey of 87 small to medium industrial land users which was undertaken in June 1997 to examine industrial property use and preferences within the Adelaide Statistical Division (ASD) of South Australia (SA). Adelaide, the state capital of South Australia has a metropolitan population of 1 million. The study was undertaken in response to a perceived mismatch by small business operators within the industrial land market between demand for and supply of industrial zoned land in Adelaide in terms of location, quality and site characteristics. The survey was undertaken across a cross section of small business land users in terms of location, tenancy and business type at a time when significant areas of industrial land within metropolitan Adelaide were being rezoned for residential and recreational purposes. Small business continues to be a major contributor to the SA economy but may be impeded in its development by uninformed planning decisions. This paper provides a focus on c...

State Leasehold and Mayan Customary Cultivation Rights in Belize

Abstract: Fears of ensuing losses of biodiversity and indigenous cultures raise important issues concerning land and development policies in indigenous communities living at the margins of protected forest reserves. Understanding the evolution of interactions between state land tenure institutions, customary land practices, and environmental changes provides insight for the maintenance of both forest habitat and native cultures. The case history of the Masewal (Yucatec Maya) village of San Antonio (Cayo), Belize, is presented because its lack of an active land market allows direct associations to be drawn between governmental land policies and customary practices. The Belizean state leasehold tenure system, implemented in the 1960s to support Masewal control over ancestral lands, has become a negative social influence leading to land underutilization, supporting rapid forest conversion to pasture land and increasing village differentiation in household access to traditional natural resources. A new form of land ten...

Landlessness and Tenancy in Early National Prince George's County, Maryland

Abstract: T THE fledgling United States of America, especially its free sector, is usually depicted as a yeoman republic largely peopled by smallscale, independent landowners. The enduring power of this perception derives from a tendency in the historiography of republicanism to accept the ideal of the independent husbandman as a reality.1 Yet landlessness and dependence on others for a living were increasingly common in the eighteenth century. Even in slave economies, planters routinely employed large numbers of wage laborers and tenants.2 A few

The Effects of Price-support Programme on Farm Tenancy Patterns and Farm Profitability: Some Evidence from Malaysia

Abstract: Translog normalised restricted profit function model is specified and estimated for the four rice granary areas, each administered by a local government body, namely, the MIP, the KIP, the NWSP, and the KEIP, in which the price-support programme has some noticeable effects on farm tenancy and farms profitability. So far, there have been no empirical studies that have used this methodological framework to analyse such economic phenomenon in Malaysia. This, in fact, is the main contribution of the present paper. From the estimated function, the shadow values of land and labour are computed, which in turn are used to elucidate the behaviour of rice farmers in Malaysia. Together, the estimated and computed results, to a large extent, are successful in explaining the observed changes in farm tenancy patterns and the way the farmers (comprised of owneroperator, owner-tenant, and tenant-farmer) are “economically” responding to the sum of profits generated from rice farming and, subsequently, from the programme. Further, given the price-support programme, the results also point to the fact that rice farming in Malaysia is as lucrative a job as any other sub-sector outside this, in particular unskilled urban workers and electronics workers, and thus this programme could be pursued further.

Long-term Public Leaseholds in Poland: Implications of Contractual Incentives

Abstract: Long-term land leaseholds are contracts that contain within them a redevelopment option. The structure of the contract influences the incentive to redevelop. We employ real option pricing techniques to evaluate the timing and intensity of the redevelopment decision by lessees in alternative contracts. We consider a contract similar to ‘perpetual usufruct,’ the public long-term land leasehold system in Poland as well as the typical North American long-term ground lease. We also consider a lease in which extension is automatic if redevelopment occurs. Our research suggests that the system of perpetual usufruct is superior to a system employing the typical North American contract when the redevelopment outcomes of these alternatives are measured against the first best outcome that results in a system with fee ownership. The research also suggests that public land-leasehold systems will result, over time, in development densities that are lower than would arise under fee ownership systems.

Commonwealth Caribbean Property Law

Abstract: 1. Introduction 2. Creation of Leases 3. Leasehold Covenants 4. Assignment,Termination of Leases and Distress 5. Statutory Tenancies Acts 6. Licences 7. Co-Ownership 8. Condominium 9. Restrictive Covenants 10. Easements 11. Mortgages 12. Adverse Possession 13. Sale of Land 14. Registration of Title Appendix 1 Sample Property Sale Agreement Appendix 2 Sample Lease Agreement Appendix 3 Sample Memorandum of Mortgage

Tenants' Rights, Procedural Wrongs: The Summary Eviction and the Need for Reform

Abstract: A summary proceeding for eviction exists in every state. Despite its different labels-summary process, summary dispossession, or forcible entry and detainer-a basic feature of ~he proceeding is its limited nature. Generally only a single issue is presented: Who is entitled to possession? The question is usually answered within six to ten days after the action is commenced. This Article suggests that this procedure fails to accommodate what scholars have called a "revolution" in the law oflandlords and residential tenants that significantly expanded tenants' rights by the adoption of such doctrines as warranties of habitability and retaliatory evictions.1 Instead, this Article suggests that the continued use of the summary proceeding, in which the determination of possession often ends the dispute, undermines many of the benefits the revolution hoped to accomplish. The nature of the proceeding not only places the tenant at a disadvantage as her relationship terminates, but also weakens her position from the time the relationship commences. Because the summary procedure for eviction enables the landlord to enforce the terms of the leasehold within a framework designed for speed ratherthan fairness, the relationship largely avoids judicial scrutiny.

Tenancies and Estoppel - After Bruton v London& Quadrant Housing Trust

Abstract: As generally understood, a tenancy2 by estoppel results where a person purports to grant a tenancy of land, but does not in fact have a sufficient interest in the land to create a tenancy: he is then estopped from denying that the relationship of landlord and tenant exists between him and the grantee. Thus where a tenant at will3 or a tenant on sufferance4 purported to grant a tenancy, and the tenant went into occupation, a tenancy by estoppel is created; likewise where a person who had contracted to purchase a freehold purported to grant a lease before completion.5 As between the parties it is as though they are actually landlord and tenant even though they are in fact not. The authorities6 describe a tenancy by estoppel as a different creature from the more familiar estoppel by representation, as a development from the doctrine of estoppel by deed,7 but extended in the field of landlord and tenant to all grants whether merely written or oral.8 A tenancy by estoppel could be said to be the result of the operation of estoppel by grant. Unlike its cousin, estoppel by grant does not rely upon any express representation as to title: 'It is the product of a fundamental principle of the common law which precludes a grantor from disputing the validity of his own grant.'9

Community, forestry and conditionality in the Gambia

Abstract: This article seeks to explain the resurgence of the 'community' scale as a central organising principle guiding contemporary environmental initiatives in Africa. It sets policies centred on the notion of community-based natural resource management in their regional political-economic context, demonstrating that fiscal constraints have forced environmental managers to rely more heavily on community efforts to accomplish environmental objectives. In effect, it argues that environmental managers confronted with increased expectations on the part of donors and their government superiors have seized the opportunity to devolve responsibility for environmental management to 'the community' as a means of expanding programmes while incurring minimal additional costs. The case study involves a German-funded community forestry project in the Gambia. In 1991, in order to speed up the implementation of 'scientific' management on state-controlled forest land, the Gambian-German Forestry Project, a branch of the national Forestry Department, began granting rural communities leasehold rights to community forestry reserves. In each instance, however, community representatives were required by contract to commit their constituencies to a rigorous set of management tasks. Participatory rhetoric notwithstanding, the project offered communities little more than graduated sovereignty over forests. Programme conditions ensured that project personnel would control the finest details of forest management, not despite, but because of, the evolution of tenure rights to the community. 21 This content downloaded from 157.55.39.35 on Fri, 02 Sep 2016 04:42:16 UTC All use subject to http://about.jstor.org/terms FORESTRY IN THE GAMBIA

Economic reform, overlapping property rights, and polarisation in the real estate market

Abstract: Economic reforms in many developing countries encompass a number of structural macro-adjustment programs with varying intensities. Adequate attention, however, has not been given to the archaic rent control and tenancy laws, which have substantially distorted the real estate market. A theoretical model is developed to analyse the overlapping property rights and stagnation created by the tenancy, rent control, and taxation laws. Utilising cases from South Asia, we show how liberalisation under existing archaic laws can further polarise the real estate market, and make the reforms socially and politically unsustainable. The historical stagnation, post-reform polarisation and demand-supply imbalances in the housing market are staggering. Reforms in the property market must reach a critical mass requiring drastic and fundamental changes in order to succeed and be sustainable.

Skills, Partnership and Tenancy in Sri Lanka Rice Farms

Abstract: This paper examines whether sharecroppers and fixed-rent tenants in the rice farms of South Asia are distinguished by their farming skills. The idea that fixed-rent contracts are typically given to relatively skilled tenants dates back to the agricultural (tenancy) ladder hypothesis of Spillman [1919]. The screening models [e.g. Hallagan 1978] that have attempted to formalize this idea assume that landlords do not observe the tenants' skill levels. This assumption is restrictive, and has found little support in empirical studies. The principal-agent model proposed in this paper focuses on the differences between time-intensive and skillintensive labor tasks. I show that tenancy contracts are designed to match the provision of these tasks with the owners of time and skill inputs. Sharecropping, in this model, provides an incentive scheme that allows for the specialization between a time-abundant tenant and a skill-abundant landlord. The second part of the paper empirically explores this result with household-level data from Sri Lanka. A two-stage model that distinguishes the choice of contract from the extent of land leased is used. The results clearly show that relatively skilled farmers are more likely to become fixed-rent tenants. I also find that, conditional on contract choice, farming skills do not affect the extent of land leased. A substantial part of the empirical analysis is devoted to the measurement of farming skills. I interpret farming skills as the contribution of observed farmer characteristics to the technical efficiency of the farm. This measure recognizes that many dimensions of skills are observed, and the use of weights computed from a production function to construct the skill index is theoretically more appealing than the ad hoc selection of proxy variables.

Agricultural Tenancy in India: Growth Promoting or Growth Retarding

Abstract: Tenancy is gaining significance in Indian agriculture in recent times. It takes the form of fixed rent in the areas of assured irrigation and sharecropping in the areas of uncertain irrigation and low cropping intensity. With high use df purchased inputs like chemical fertilizers and pesticides, the importance of tenancy declined in rain-fed agriculture. There is no evidence of inter-linked transactions of land, labour and credit in the areas studied in Andhro Pradesh. On the other hand, tenancy leads to increase in labour use, cultivation of high valued crops, high participation of family labour and development of non-farm activities like dairying. Though tenancy agreements are oral and for short period, there is no frequent change of tenants. However, legalizing tenancy confers certain benefits to the tenants like access to the credit and insurance markets and removes imperfections in the land markets like choosing the tenant on the basis of caste.

RENT: Notes on Efficiency Pricing, Rent Control and Monopolistic Landlords

Abstract: We consider a model of 'tenancy rent control' where landlords are not allowed to raise the rent on sitting tenants nor to evict them, though they are free to set the nominal rent when taking on a new tenant. If there is any inflation in the economy, landlords prefer to take shortstaying tenants. Assuming that there is no way for landlords to tell a tenant's type, an adverse selection problem arises. If in this context, landlords have monopoly power--which, as we argue, is indeed pervasive--then the housing market equilibria can exhibit some unexpected properties. Most strikingly, landlords may prefer not to raise the rent even when there is excess demand for housing. Such rents are labeled "efficiency rents" in this paper and their existence shows that tenancy rent control can give rise to equilibria which look as it there were traditional rent control in which the rent of each unit has a flat ceiling. In other words, tenancy rent control may not achieve the flexibility, which it was expected to impart, to the system of traditional rent control.

Tenants' Rights, Procedural Wrongs: The Summary Eviction and the Need for Reform

Abstract: A summary proceeding for eviction exists in every state. Despite its different labels-summary process, summary dispossession, or forcible entry and detainer-a basic feature of ~he proceeding is its limited nature. Generally only a single issue is presented: Who is entitled to possession? The question is usually answered within six to ten days after the action is commenced. This Article suggests that this procedure fails to accommodate what scholars have called a "revolution" in the law oflandlords and residential tenants that significantly expanded tenants' rights by the adoption of such doctrines as warranties of habitability and retaliatory evictions.1 Instead, this Article suggests that the continued use of the summary proceeding, in which the determination of possession often ends the dispute, undermines many of the benefits the revolution hoped to accomplish. The nature of the proceeding not only places the tenant at a disadvantage as her relationship terminates, but also weakens her position from the time the relationship commences. Because the summary procedure for eviction enables the landlord to enforce the terms of the leasehold within a framework designed for speed ratherthan fairness, the relationship largely avoids judicial scrutiny.