Land and property are usually the most important physical assets for poor households. In low-income countries served by the World Bank’s International Development Association (IDA), land reform is an important part of IDA’s overall effort to address poverty and growth constraints, foster better environmental management, and promote gender equality. It also helps societies rebuild after conflicts and natural disasters, such as in Sri Lanka and Aceh, Indonesia. Global experience shows that interventions to improve security, access, and transferability of land increase the value of household assets, generate higher levels of investment and agricultural productivity, and facilitate access to credit.

The land sector represents only a small share of IDA lending, but it is an area where IDA excels in supporting key policy and institutional changes by its clients, by bringing attention to an issue that impedes development in general and rural poverty reduction in particular.

Learn more about IDA’s work on land policy:

Download 8-page brief - PDF, June 2007

In Vietnam’s Ha Nam province, re-issuing land titles with two names has benefitted women like Troung Thi Huong: “With this land title, I now have the same rights as my husband to borrow money.”
Watch Troung and others describe what has changed.