Land Market With Fragmented Landownership Rights in Bulgaria: An Institutional Approach

The land restitution in Bulgaria led to a severe fragmentation in land ownership. This has an impact on the agricultural development and land market. The article investigates the land transactions on the sale and rentals markets. In order to explain the processes three new institutional economic theories will be employed: property rights theory, transaction costs theory and agricultural contract theory. First, the article reviews the appropriateness of each theory, and second, results of conducted survey in two regions of Bulgaria with different degrees of land fragmentation. Key words: Bulgaria, Contractual arrangements, Land fragmentation, Land market, Land transactions, Property rightsBulgaria, Contractual arrangements, Land fragmentation, Land market, Land transactions, Property rights, Land Economics/Use,

Agricultural Land Fragmentation and Land Consolidation Rationality

Adopted about one year after the 1989 Revolution, Land Law (Law 18/1991) represented the starting point of land reform in Romania. As a result of this law implementation, at the beginning of the year 2000 the private sector owned 84% of total agricultural land: 82% of arable land, 74% of land under vineyards, 67% of land under orchards and 87% of land under meadows and pastures. Besides the benefic social and economic effects, the mutations produced represent a distortion source in the rural area, determining the following, among others: a) crisis of ownership relations - a main aspect of this being the confusion concerning the ownership rights. The prolongation of clearing up these rights represents a major obstacle to a good operation of land market, to agricultural land consolidation implicitly; b) managerial crisis, manifested by the lack of competitive behaviour, which gives an increased importance to the production function, to the detriment of commercial function; this results in the increased share of small-sized subsistence farms (households), lack of strategic orientations, etc; c) land market crisis - occurred in the context of the lack of legal and institutional framework concerning the land market operation (credits in advantageous conditions for buying land through the banking system or by establishing specialised banks, solving up the problems in connection to using land as collateral for obtaining credits, mortgage credit stimulation); d) crisis of agricultural economic efficiency - mainly generated by land property excessive fragmentation, large area (about 55%) owned by old persons or by persons not having their domicile in the rural area, lack of main production factors combination, limited circulation of land capital, lack of an adequate legal and institutional framework, etc. An analysis of the concrete, social and economic situation of land fragmentation and of agricultural land consolidation opportunity was conducted in the commune Balaciu; this commune is located in the plain area, with a population of 3540 inhabitants and a total area of 8462 ha. In order to identify the rural social actors which can favour land consolidation by their structure, behaviour and functionality, the following typology of rural households has been used as methodology: agricultural households (consisting of persons working only in agriculture); pluriactive households (consisting of persons involved in both agricultural and non-agricultural activities); non-active households (consisting of non-active persons); non-agricultural households (only persons working in other non-agricultural activities). The survey revealed that the main entities which can become the social actors of rural/agricultural modernisation, of land consolidation implicitly are the pluriactive and non-agricultural households. In order to consolidate the agricultural land, there is an obvious and imperative need to conceive a well articulated and coherent framework of support measures, understood and treated as a complex of economic, social, legal and technical measures, aiming at rural community development.Farm Management, Land Economics/Use,

Valuing Natural Space and Landscape Fragmentation in Richmond, VA

Hedonic pricing methods and GIS (Geographic Information Systems) were used to evaluate relationships between sale price of single family homes and landscape fragmentation and natural land cover. Spatial regression analyses found that sale prices increase as landscapes become less fragmented and the amount of natural land cover around a home increases. The projected growth in population and employment in the Richmond, Virginia region and subsequent increases in land development and landscape fragmentation presents a challenge to sustaining intact healthy ecosystems in the Richmond region. Spatial regression analyses helped illuminate how land cover patterns influence sale prices and landscape patterns that are economically and ecologically advantageous

LAND OWNERSHIP CONSOLIDATION IN THE CONTEXT OF SUSTAINABLE DEVELOPMENT

Land consolidation is seen today as an important instrument which facilitates the improvement of the agricultural infrastructure in general and the development of agriculture by creating a structure of exploitation in accordance with the market demands. The consolidation of land ownerships may be an effective and active land management instrument which not only addresses the problems of land fragmentation, but also, if applied sensitively, may be an instrument for delivering sustainable rural development in a wider context. The aim of this research is to investigate land consolidation as an essential tool to create sustainable rural areas in Romanialand consolidation; land fragmentation; sustainable development.

Optimal Economic Landscapes with Habitat Fragmentation Effects

Habitat fragmentation is widely considered a primary threat to biodiversity. This paper develops a theoretical model of land use to analyze the optimal conservation of landscapes when land quality is spatially heterogeneous and wildlife habitat is fragmented and socially valuable. When agriculture is the primary cause of fragmentation, we show that reforestation efforts should be targeted to the most fragmented landscapes with an aggregate share of forest equal to a threshold, defined by the ratio of the opportunity cost of conversion to the social value of core forest. When urban development is the primary cause of fragmentation, we show how spatial heterogeneity in amenities and household neighbor preferences affect the optimal landscape and the design of land-use policies.Land Economics/Use,

The Impact of Land Fragmentation on Beef Cattle Inventory

Many groups have discussed with alarm the impact of agricultural land conversion to non-agricultural uses. This research indicates little evidence that beef cow inventory has been negatively affected by land fragmentation. Average acres per transaction, total transactions, or a fragmentation index did not have an important effect on cattle inventory.Land Economics/Use, Livestock Production/Industries,

LAND FRAGMENTATION AND CONSOLIDATION IN ALBANIA

The 1945 agrarian reform in Albania changed the distribution of landownership. The land of the largest landlords was distributed to 70,000 families who either did not own any land or owned very little. Since this agrarian reform, land tenure structures have continually changed according to the organizational form of the agricultural sector. In the early 1990s, when the centralized economy was transformed into a market economy, landownership also had to change. Through the application of a 1991 law, approximately 383,000 families received about 500,000 hectares from the ex-cooperatives. In 1992, state-farm workers' families obtained the state-farm land. As a result of privatization, 480,000 farms were created. Land fragmentation is a relatively new phenomenon in Albania, but when privatization of agricultural land was concluded each family had a farm holding that was fragmented into many different parcels. Land fragmentation in Albania appears to be a spatial and territorial phenomenon, which means subdivision into many parcels of farmland that cannot support rational utilization of land. This paper concerns land fragmentation and consolidation in Albania after land privatization. The objectives of the paper are to provide information on the level of land fragmentation in the districts included in this study, determine the impacts of land fragmentation, explore methods of land consolidation based on both Albanian and foreign experience, and disseminate the information and conclusions throughout the country.Consolidation of land holdings--Albania, Farms, Size of--Albania, Farms, Small--Albania, Fragmentation of land holdings--Albania, Agrarian structure--Albania, Land Economics/Use,

TECHNICAL EFFICIENCY OF CHINESE GRAIN PRODUCTION: A STOCHASTIC PRODUCTION FRONTIER APPROACH

This article examines technical efficiency of the Chinese grain sector using the framework of stochastic production frontier. The results reveal that: the marginal products of labor and fertilizer are much smaller than that of land; human capital and farm-level specialization have positive effect on efficiency, land fragmentation is detrimental to efficiency, and elder farmers are as efficient as younger farmers. We also examine the effects of size, mechanization and geographic location. Simulation results show that significant output gains can be obtained by eliminating land fragmentation, improving rural education and promoting specialization and mechanization.Crop Production/Industries, Productivity Analysis,

The economics of land fragmentation in the north of Vietnam

Land fragmentation, in which a single farm household operates more than one separate piece of land, is significant issue in Vietnamese agriculture, especially in the North. For the whole country, there are about 75 million plots of land, an average of 7-8 plots per farm household. Such fragmentation can be seen to have negative and positive benefits for farm households and the community generally. The negative impacts can be reduced mechanisation, higher cost, loss of land due to boundaries, increased negative externalities, and more limited application of new technologies. On the other hand, land fragmentation may have some benefits to farmers such as spreading output risk, seasonal labour use, and crop diversification. Comparative static analysis and analysis of survey data have led to the conclusion that small sized farms are likely to be more fragmented and the number of plots held by a household is not a significant determinant of yield and output risk spreading but is a significant factor in crop diversification. Policies which allow the appropriate opportunity cost of labour to be reflected at the farm level may provide appropriate incentives to trigger farm size change and land consolidation. Policies which tip the benefits in favour of fewer and larger plots such as strong and effective research and development, an active extension system and strong administrative management may also lead to land consolidation and thus allow some of the benefits which will accrue to the economy more generally to be obtained by farmers.Land Economics/Use,

The economics of land fragmentation in the north of Vietnam

Land fragmentation, where a single farm has a number of parcels of land, is a common feature of agriculture in many countries, especially in developing countries. In Vietnam, land fragmentation is common, especially in the north. For the whole country, there are about 75 million parcels of land, an average of seven to eight plots per farm household. Such fragmentation can be seen to have negative and positive benefits for farm households and the community generally. Comparative statics analysis and analysis of survey data have led to the conclusion that small-sized farms are likely to be more fragmented, and that fragmentation had a negative impact on crop productivity and increased family labour use and other money expenses. Policies which allow the appropriate opportunity cost of labour to be reflected at the farm level may provide appropriate incentives to trigger farm size change and land consolidation. Policies which tip the benefits in favour of fewer and larger plots, such as strong and effective research and development, an active extension system and strong administrative management, may also lead to land consolidation.development economics, land fragmentation, land use and tenure, production economics, Resource /Energy Economics and Policy,