[Photo: FILE]

Delays in survey plan approvals continue to hold up land registration and property development.

The Lands Ministry is now turning to digital technology to address longstanding administrative bottlenecks and speed up the process.

The introduction of an electronic survey plan lodgement system is expected to reduce manual processing, improve accountability and speed up applications that are critical to land registration, subdivision and property development.

Lands and Mineral Resources Minister Filimoni Vosarogo told Parliament that the Department of Lands had introduced the e-Plan Lodgement System, also known as the e-Portal, this year, allowing registered surveyors from both the private sector and government agencies to submit survey plans electronically.

The platform also provides online payment facilities, electronic submission of requisitions and visibility over the progress of applications.

Vosarogo said the Ministry was progressively moving towards a fully digital assessment process to reduce manual handling and minimise delays associated with the submission and resubmission of survey plans.

The reforms come amid longstanding administrative challenges within the survey assessment process, where delays can hold up land registration, property development and potential investment.

But digitising the lodgement process is only one part of the Ministry’s response.

Vosarogo said the Department was also strengthening the technical capacity of its Plan Assessment Unit through staff training and the introduction of modern surveying and computer-aided assessment software.

This includes the use of 12D and DISCAD, which the Minister said would improve the accuracy and efficiency of assessments and allow applications to be processed more quickly.

Another area of concern is the coordination between government agencies involved in clearing survey plans before land registration can proceed.

Vosarogo said the Ministry was strengthening its working relationship with the Department of Town and Country Planning, the Titles Office and other relevant stakeholders to address delays involving statutory approvals.

He said the Department was actively tracking lodged plans, identifying outstanding survey corrections and following up on applications awaiting clearances from other agencies.

The Minister maintained that the objective was to reduce approval times while ensuring all survey plans continued to meet technical and regulatory requirements.