Agenda 21

Local governments are using Agenda 21 as a guide in developing policies, land use, zoning and land development criteria for “sustainable development”. The following is from the Agenda 21 document:

SOURCE: UN Department of Economic and Social Affairs
Division for sustainable Development:

AGENDA 21

C. Promoting sustainable land-use planning and management

Basis for action

7.27. Access to land resources is an essential component of sustainable low-impact lifestyles. Land resources are the basis for (human) living systems and provide soil, energy, water and the opportunity for all human activity.

In rapidly growing urban areas, access to land is rendered increasingly difficult by the conflicting demands of industry, housing, commerce, agriculture, land tenure structures and the need for open spaces.

Furthermore, the rising costs of urban land prevent the poor from gaining access to suitable land. In rural areas, unsustainable practices, such as the exploitation of marginal lands and the encroachment on forests and ecologically fragile areas by commercial interests and landless rural populations, result in environmental degradation, as well as in diminishing returns for impoverished rural settlers.

Objective


7.28. The objective is to provide for the land requirements of human settlement development through environmentally sound physical planning and land use so as to ensure access to land to all households and, where appropriate, the encouragement of communally and collectively owned and managed land. Particular attention should be paid to the needs of women and indigenous people for economic and cultural reasons.

Activities

7.29. All countries should consider, as appropriate, undertaking a comprehensive national inventory of their land resources in order to establish a land information system in which land resources will be classified according to their most appropriate uses and environmentally fragile or disaster-prone areas will be identified for special protection measures.

7.30. Subsequently, all countries should consider developing national land-resource management plans to guide land-resource development and utilization and, to that end, should:

(a) Establish, as appropriate, national legislation to guide the implementation of public policies for environmentally sound urban development, land utilization, housing and for the improved management of urban expansion;

(b) Create, where appropriate, efficient and accessible land markets that meet community development needs by, inter alia, improving land registry systems and streamlining procedures in land transactions;

(c) Develop fiscal incentives and land-use control measures, including land-use planning solutions for a more rational and environmentally sound use of limited land resources;

(d) Encourage partnerships among the public, private and community sectors in managing land resources for human settlements development;

(e) Strengthen community-based land-resource protection practices in existing urban and rural settlements;

(f) Establish appropriate forms of land tenure that provide security of tenure for all land-users, especially indigenous people, women, local communities, the low-income urban dwellers and the rural poor;

(g) Accelerate efforts to promote access to land by the urban and rural poor, including credit schemes for the purchase of land and for building/acquiring or improving safe and healthy shelter and infrastructure services;

(h) Develop and support the implementation of improved land-management practices that deal comprehensively with potentially competing land requirements for agriculture, industry, transport, urban development, green spaces, preserves and other vital needs;

(i) Promote understanding among policy makers of the adverse consequences of unplanned settlements in environmentally vulnerable areas and of the appropriate national and local land-use and settlements policies required for this purpose.

The organization established to promote Agenda 21 goals and objectives is:
International Council for Local Environmental Initiatives (ICLEI)

“ICLEI is an international association of local governments as well as national and regional local government organizations who have made a commitment to sustainable development.”

We in the real estate development industry are not organized nor have funds available to overcome the influence of ICLEI --- at the local level.