enhancing tenure security in albanian forest land

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ILC-NACFP:-Final Report on Enhancing Tenure Security on Communal Forest and Pastures in Albania

Financed byEnhancing Tenure Security Through Support the Communities

to Improve the Laws on Transfer of State Public Property

(Forest and Pasture) to the Communes

FINAL REPORT


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A h


Acknowledgements and Working Team

Acknowledgements

There are too many people to mention here, whose kindness and help provedso crucial in the completion of this work.The preparation of this Report wouldnot have been possible without the strong support given to the consultantsnot only by the project experts and staff but alsow by SNV Tirana, Dibra andKorca offices, Communal Forest and Pasture Regional Federation of Kukesi,

Puka, Elbasani and Dibra, FPUA-s of selected communes and regions, DFS,DFPP and other Government Institutions, to Mr. Rexhep Uka, Idriz Xhumara,Rahim Kaleci, members of parliament for they very good support andparticipation on the activities of project implementations,

At the International Land Coalition (ILC) Bruce More and his fine staff wereextremely welcoming and helpful, especially Annalisa Mauro BarbaraCodispoti, Hedwige Croquette and Stefano Di Gessa.ILC-s staffs energy,insights and warmth were outstanding. For Albanian NACFP this cooperationis a good preparatory step to apply for being member of ILC and an opendoor for more cooperation in the near future,

Working team:

Mr.Thimaq Lako

Mr. Abdulla Diku

Mr. Rexhep Ndreu

Mr. Pashk Prendi

Mr. Trifon Cfarku


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CONTENTS

EXECUTIVE SUMMARY

CHAPTER 1. S ETTING THE SCENE

1. INTRODUCTION

2. COMMUNES: THE BASIC ADMINISTRATIVE UNIT OF COMUNAL FORESTRY

3. PROJECT DESCRIPTION

CHAPTER 2. METHODOLOGY

1. CHOICE OF THE REGIONS

2. MAJOR ASPECTS OF THE METHODOLOGY

3. STEPS FOLLOWED

3.1. Review of the existing literature, reports and materials

3.2. Field surveys and establishment of contact with local people and

representatives.

3.3. Preparations, sending out and evaluation of questionnaires

3.4. Building the local structures for project implementation (Commune and

village commissions)

3.5. Data collection

3.6. Demarcation of boundaries at village forest

3.7. Certification of users of forest and pastures4. LOBBING AND ADVOCACY

5. SCHEDULE OF PROJECT IMPLEMENTATION


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1.2. Government and relevant sector policy(ies)

1.2.1. Legislature

1.2.2. Judiciary

1.2.3. Administration

1.3. Land tenure policy(ies)

1.4. The current status of land tenure

1.4.1. The status of inventory and transfer of state properties

1.4.2. Unresolved policy issues

1.4.3. Restitution of property rights to former owners1.4.4. Taxation of land and property

1.4.5. Rural land administration

1.5. Progress on land reform in Albania

1.5.1. Rural land and property reform policies

1.5.2. Refused agricultural lands

1.5.3. Pastures and meadows

1.5.4. Forests1.5.5. Transfer of communal forests and pastures

1.5.6. Protected Areas

1.5.7. Village lands and properties

1.5.8. Rural poverty and Land Holding

1.5.9. Inventory and transfer of state properties

1.6. Communal forestry [(from the top to the bottom: Ministry, DFS,Communes, Villages (fshati), Neighborhood (mehalla), Clan (fisi), Household

(shpija)]2 HISTORICAL AND CURRENT MODES: SHARED AND ASSIGNED ACCESS TO


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2 .2.4. From study to implementation: Transfer of forest and pasture

process

2.3. Transfer of State Forest and Pastures of Bazi Commune (District of Mat)

2 .3.1. Geographical position

2 .3.2. History and tradition

2 .3.3. Bazihouseholds structure2.3.4. From study to implementation: The process of transfer of forest and

pastures 2.4. Transfer of State Forest and Pastures of Gore Commune (District of

Korca)2.4.1. Geographical position2.4.2. History and tradition2.4.3. Gore households structure2.4.4. From study to implementation: The process of transfer of forest and

pastures

CHAPTER 4. COMMUNAL FOREST: RELEVANCE AND SUSTAINABILITY1. FROM CONFLICT TO COLLABORATION

2. THE VILLAGERS PERSPECTIVE

3. THE ALLOCATION OF FOREST AND PASTURE RESOURCES

4. EXISTING INFORMAL TYPES OF OWNERSHIP

5. CUSTOMARY LAND RIGHT AND NEW LEGAL PROMISES

6. FOREST REVENUE AND FEES

7. THE FOREST TRANSFER: AN IRREVERSIBLE PROCESS

CHAPTER 5. LOBING AND ADVOCACY

1. NACFP LOBBING ON LAND TENURE SECURITY

1.1. Chronology of Activities on Advocacy and Lobbying


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LIST OF APPENDICES

Appendix 1 : For the creation of the Commission of Forests and Pastures of theVillage (Template document)

Appendix 2 : For establishing the communes commission for forests andpastures

Appendix 3: Approval of activities for transferring communal forests and pasturesin use of the village (Template document)

Appendix 4: Certificate of users right (Template document

)

Appendix 5. For Settling the Boundaries of Forests and Pastures for the Village

(Template document

)

Appendix 6: Sketch of a parcel division with the users names and signatures

Appendix 7: Population, Households structure, Agricultural land, and theLivestock structure in the commune of Blerimi

Appendix 8: Population, Households structure, Agricultural land, and the Livestock

structure in the commune of Stebleva

Appendix 9: Population, Households structure, Agricultural land, and theLivestock structure in the commune of Bazi

Appendix 10: Population, Households structure, Agricultural land, and theLivestock structure in the commune of Gore


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ABBREVIATIONS AND ACRONYMS

AFP Albania Forestry Projecta.e.u Agricultural Economic UnitANFI Albanian National Forest InventoryCFPUAs Communal Forest and Pasture Users AssociationsCFPM Communal forest and pasture managementCFPMp Communal forest and pasture management planCOM Council of Ministers

DGFP Directorate General of Forests and PasturesDFPP Directorate of Forest and Pasture PoliciesDFS Directorate of Forest Service in DistrictEU European UnionFAO Food and Agriculture Organization of the United NationsFPRI Forest and Pasture Research InstituteFS Forest sectorGDP Gross Domestic Product

ILC International Land CoalitionINSTAT Institute of StatisticsLGU Local Government UnitMEFWA Ministry of Environment, Forestry and Water AdministrationMIA Ministry of Interim AffairsMOAF Ministry of Agriculture and Food

NACFP National Association of Communal Forest and PastureNATIA National Agency of Transfer of Immobile Assets

NGO Non-Governmental OrganizationNPO Non Profit OrganizationNRDP Natural Resource Development ProjectNTFP Non-Timber Forest ProductNWFP Non Wood Forest Product


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of Order, NRDP consultants, to the Local Government throughout the projectimplementation.

For the commodity of the reader in this report Forest shall unless otherwisespecified, designate forest, shrubs as well as associated biocenosis

Communal Forest is Forest in use/ownership of commune, used by the communesinhabitants for firewood, grazing, and other every day needs of villagers


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CHAPTER 1

SETTING THE SCENE


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1. INTRODUCTION

Bounded on the west by the Adriatic Sea and sandwiched between former Yugoslavia

to the north and Greece to the south, Albania is a mainly hilly and mountainous country,

with a beautiful but rugged terrain. The GDP per capita is US$ 1,196. More than 60% of

Albanias rural households own less than 0.8 ha of land. Out of this number, three

quarters of the households living in mountainous areas have less than 0.5 ha at hand.

Only 16% of the total land area lies below 100 m, 55% falls between 100 and 1,000 m

and 29% is above 1,000 m. As such, the land used for agriculture is often sloping, with

only ca. 44% of the agricultural land having a slope of less than 5%. In many parts of the

country, climatic and soil conditions are favorable for forest and pasture growth.

The majority of land resources consist in areas covered by forest and pastures (ca.

52% or 1.5 million ha). Traditionally in the Mediterranean region, forests have provided a

large variety of other products, with revenues sometimes exceeding the value of wood

(Scarascia-Mugnozza et al., 2000). Albanian forests are the primary source of wood and of

the many of non-timber forest products that include medicinal and aromatic plants, food andbeverages, fodder, perfumes, cosmetics, fiber, gums, resins, and ornamentals and materials

for dyeing and tanning, plant protection, utensils and handicrafts. Historically, forests in

Albania were spared the devastation that occurred in other Mediterranean countries. In

the 1930s industrial harvesting began on an unsustainable level (Bosworth, 1975) and

has continued since then. In contrast to arable land, most of the forest and pasture land has

always been public. According to Ottoman law, all land was owned by the state. Communal

ownership occurred in areas that had certain autonomy from Ottoman rule. While arable

land later became private, forests remained state-owned and with open access. Forests

belonging to religious institutions were another form of communal ownership. This tenure


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transition of the country from a command to a market economy has accelerated the

degradation of the forest resource due to ambiguous property rights and lack of funding

for management and protection. Natural and human potential is not used efficiently

because of inadequate infrastructural, organizational, and financial structures and

arrangements. In contrast to the importance of forests, their contribution to the Albanian

economy, based primarily on wood production, seems to be very lowonly 6 percent of

the total agricultural output in 1990 (World Bank 1996). The estimate does not include

significant amounts of forest products harvested individually or illegally and therefore

not recorded. Furthermore, marketable NTFPs such as medicinal and aromatic plants

(currently an important export item) are not included, since they are considered part of

the food industry. By taking all these into account, plus non-market values of the forest

ecosystems, the importance of the forests is considerably more than the above published

value. This undervaluation of the forest sector is one of the reasons for the neglect by

politicians and bureaucrats.

Forest and pasture types are diverse because of local weather patterns and ecological and

topographic conditions as well as millennia of anthropogenic influences. Despite differencesin vegetation, habitat types, and human usage, Albanian forests and pastures also have some

common features. Most of these ecosystems are particularly fragile, unstable, and

unsustainable because of the interaction of natural factors (steepness, summer droughts, and

torrential rains) and social forces (fire, grazing, and over-cutting). Considering specific

climate and vegetation criteria, naturalists have identified five phyto-climatic zones in

Albania, which range from the maquis in the coast to alpine grasslands at the elevations

above 2000 m (Nako, 1969). Such an extent of the forest and pasture land demonstrates

the enormous potential that Albania has for the development of forestry (Naka et al.,

2000).


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(Sjoberg, 1989). As can be depicted from Figure 1, forest resources of the country have

paid so much in the last 5 decades, most of them being transformed in agricultural lands.

Figure 1: Changes in population, forest and pastures during the last decades

Figure 1a. Distribution of human populationin Albania according to the altitude.

Figure 1b. Development of Forest andPastures areas and the human population inthe period 1945-2005.

Population (%)

Altitude (m)

Source: Adopted from INSTAT 2001


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uncertainties. A thread running throughout the story of Albania's rural land privatization

experience has been the failure of government authorities to enforce the law. Ownership-

related problems generally had in one way or another to do with insistence that pre-

collectivization ownership rights be restored. Such demands could lead to conflicts

between villagers, between entire villages and the state, and to a refusal to sign the deed

unless such rights were recognized

Under such circumstances, Albanian farmers try to obtain those natural resources that

bear a relatively low cost (not to say without cost at all), out of which they get a sufficient

level of satisfaction/utility to meet the families perceived basic needs. One naturalresources meeting those requirements is the everlasting partner of man, the forest, which

in the case of Albania occupies 36% of the total land area. Through the privatization of

agricultural land and the constant trend of livestock sub sector expansion, the pressure on

Albanias natural resources, in particular in rural areas, has increased substantially. This

pressure is exerted not only by the fulfillment of local needs but also by profit interests,

and this national natural asset continues to be undervalued not only by the general public

but also by regulatory owners and authorities; as a consequence it will be misused.

Those difficulties were augmented by the claims of ex-land owners, which led to

many other problems that continue to the present day. On the other hand, the entry of

many agricultural products into Albania from neighboring countries found unprepared

and unprotected Albanian new owners. Under such circumstances, many members of the

labor force from those agricultural units turned their attention to the possibility of

emigration and working on farms and in other jobs in neighboring countries. Accordingly

part of the land in Albania was transformed into non-arable or abandoned land (that were

naturally converted to poor quality pastures).

Albanian forest and pastures resources have been degraded significantly over the last


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Firewood production is actually a very complex social and ecological problem. Forest

harvesting in hilly slopes followed by non-controlled grazing, has lead to land

degradation which nowadays is a common phenomena. Data in the Figure 2, shows that

60% of families interviewed get the firewood directly from the forest. These are families

with low levels of income, often using plots of forest set aside for that purpose by the

communes.

Figure 2. Sources of firewood used in household in Albania

Source: Social Economic Survey, ACER, 2001


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Considering the main criteria where the land reform was based and relatively uniform

size (an average 55 km 2 ), the communes can be considered as relatively homogenous

units in the land resources. Map No.1 shows the Administrative Divisions of Albania,

with borders of all units: Communes, Municipalities, Districts and Regions.

The process of forest and pastures transfer in Albania started with a pilot project in

three communes on Elbasani district in August 1994. After the pilot phase in 1996, World

Bank through Albanian Forestry Project (1996-2004) supported the forest transfer to the

communes. The Communal Forest and Pastures Management (CFPM) can be considered

as very successful in terms of achievements made but also for its pioneer role in thissector. Never before has been the local forestry developed in Albania. During the

Ottoman period, the land and natural resources were recognized as God present and

during the communist period they belonged to the State. Nevertheless, traditional land

ownership has always been kept at village level and is today used for defining the

boundaries and users of the communal forests and pastures. The CFPMp is pioneer in

communal forestry as it developed the instruments and applied them to realize the

transfer of forests and pastures foreseen in the law. The proposed methodology hasproven to be supported by the communities and from 30 communes planed the transfer

was realized in 138 communes in the end of AFP.

3. PROJECT DESCRIPTION

The common good is placed before private damage. ( E mira e prbashkt i

paravehet damit t veant). (Kanuni i Lek Dukagjinit)(Fox, 1989: 81-82)

The sentence taken from the Kanun (customary law governing the daily life for

centuries in Albania that held the culture together for generations providing certain


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(kujrit) of a village; beyond this of the bajrak (district). There were several layers of

government: clan chiefs, village elders, minor elders and the people themselves.

An important point emerging from this account of pre-Communist local government

is the close relationship between individual and community: The community sense was

fostered by every art the mountaineers knew. The humblest man was encouraged to

regard his village or group of villages as his personal property. If home, village or group

of villages prospered, he rejoiced as if he himself had been advanced (de Waals, 2004)

As seen from these litle passages, people in Albania had a long tradition of common

use and/or family use of forests and pastures. This early tradition, amongst others, hasbeen the motivation for the support of the program of the transfer of state forests and

pastures for communal use during the 1995-2004, an important component of the

Forestry Project funded by the World Bank and the Italian Government. By the end of

2005, the transfer process was completed for 140 communes (from the total of 309

communes). For a better use of the investments, the Communal Forest and Pasture Users

Associations (CFPUA) were established in all the Communes where the transfer process

was completed. Among the main achievements of this process, one can mention: (1) participation of villagers on the transfer process and on management plans

implementation; (2) the change of attitudes of local communities and foresters toward

communal forests and pastures; (3) slowing down or stopping the further degradation of

natural resources and beginning of their rehabilitation; along with (4) the impact over

poverty reduction in the related areas.

However, mainly because of the property rights issues, not everything has gone asexpected. Property rights issues represent at the moment key challenges faced by Albania

in moving toward sustainable resource management and use and repairing some of the

enormous environmental damage done over the past 5 6 decades As shown from many


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elders of the bajrak, and as many young people and children as possible from the villages

of the district so that the boundary will be retained in memory. Every tract of land,

whether field or meadow, garden or vineyard, small forest or copse, woodland or pasture

or house grounds, village, bajrak or house, all are divided by boundaries ( Guri i kufinit

k per rreth dishmitar. Kta jn a gjasht a dymbdhet paperdhok (gur t vogjel), t

cillt vorrohen nen dh rreth e rreth prit t kufinit. N t ngulun t kufijve, pos shpijave

nder fjal, duhet t jen edh pleqt e katundit, pleqt e flamurit e sa m shum prej t rish

e fmish e edh prej katundesh t rrethit, qi t mbahet n mend kufini. Se e cilla tok, po

kje ar a livadh, kopsht a vsht, prozhem a zabel, xn a ograj, a rrethi i shpis,

katundi me katund a Flamuri me Flamur e shpija me shpi, kan t damet me kufi).

Significantly, throughout the Communist period village families had continued to

transmit knowledge of traditional clan boundaries in the forest. This was despite the ban

on such customs and the fact that wood was supplied by the local Communist

administration. Although most of the demarking boundaries were known, many problems

arose in post-communsit era and fixing and demarcating boundaries between districts,

communes and villages has been a chronic problem. Ex co-operative boundaries whichserved as the initial basis for communal boundaries, frequently failed to line up with the

pre-1945 boundaries of their component villages because the forest and pasture land were

not part of ex-cooperative boundaries. Prior to 1946, some villages held title to several

hectares of forest land that were later owned and managed by the state forest service.

After de-collectivization, there was no attempt to restore the original boundaries, between

Communes and Forest Service until project intervention raised the approach of

communal forestry. The philosophy of the transfer of State forests and pastures tothe communes has been the recognition of the needs of forests products and services

by the local population and their rights on their use. In addition, the transfer is


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The law and procedures applied, have not taken into consideration the traditional use, real

users, village representatives, and has not set up any criteria and regulations for process

implementation in participatory way. There have been several reasons that have hindered

the progress, but perhaps the most important have been:

Differences between DGFP and communes on how much and which land should

be eligible for transfer.

Slowness of communes in preparing their inventory lists, often due to a fear that

they may end up worse off or simply because of a lack of capacity.

The requirement that the DFP approve forests that the commune requests fortransfer, something that has occasionally been slow in coming. Communes have

also been tending to ask more than the MOAF is willing to authorize transfer for.

Difficulties in setting communes boundaries in several cases, with the biggest

conflicts arising over pasture boundaries among villages and communes and over

control over water sources.

Lacking legal personality within the current local government framework, villages assuch, are excluded from land ownership and any say, except in an advisory capacity, on

how common village resources such as pastures should be used or allocated.

Based on the previous experiences gained during the last years, National Association

of Communal Forest and Pasture has undertaken this project aiming on sheding light on

the reasons why the process of transfer of forest and pasture from state to the communes

is going slow, identifing the bottlenecks and to propose the solutions to help solving

some of the above-mentioned. The overall objective is preparation in participatory way

clear guidelines and criteria on fixing and demarcating boundaries between state owned

forest and communal forest and share of the rights and responsibilities between them,


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Map No. 1: Administrative Divisions: Communes, Municipalities, Districts and Regions

in Albania


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CHAPTER 2

METHODOLOGY


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1. CHOICE OF THE REGIONSIn choosing the regions where the project was to be implemented, several factors such

as the geographical location, total area, area covered by forest, number of communes etc.

were taken into account. Apart form those above-mentioned criteria, a very important

role played the historical traditions especially in forest and pasture ownership and

management, as well as historical bias. Regions were chosen to be representative of the

whole country as can be seen in the Map 2.

Insert the Map of the country with the representative communes.

Puka District is part of Shkodra region and represents more or less the traditions of

Lezha, Shkodra, and Kukesi. Located in Albanian Alps, the commune of Blerimi

represents the typical northern village with scattered houses that are usually apart from

each other and accessible only by rugged footpaths. These footpaths are often not

passable in bad weather. When houses are found in clusters, they are usually inhabited byfamilies of the same clan. Good quality of agricultural land in this area is minimal, and

farms are small with high level of land fragmentation. This makes farming very difficult

since the use of large machinery for ploughing and harvesting is not cost-effective on

such small plots. Generally in northern areas the infrastructure such as roads and access

to market is relatively undeveloped. The area is commonly cited both in ethnographic

literature and by Albanian people today as having maintained more tribal customs than

other districts due to mountains locations and relative isolation from outside influence.

Field trips to the area provide evidence of cultural patterns that are distinct from middle

or south mountain Albania and especially from western plain


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located in the east part of the region just in the boundary with Macedonia. The commune

shares the boundaries between the districts of Librazhdi and Bulqiza.

On the southern part of the country, the district of Korca was chosen as the one

displaying the characteristics of the whole region. The topography in this district is

various; plain fields, hills and mountain. Almost all the Korca plain areas are surrounded

by hills and mountains. An exception of this classification is the Commune of Gora (the

word Gore comes from the Slavic language and means mountain with forest). In

Albanian history and culture, Korca is known for the first school in Albanian language (7

mars 1871). In term of agriculture, Korca has been well-known for high level of tree cropproduction especially apple trees as well as the agricultural and diary products. Typical

crops are wheat, maize and some vegetables. Sugar Beet was typical for the Korca plain

in the communist regime and ruins of sugar production factory are part of the plain

landscape. Animal farming is predominantly comprised of cows and sheep. Korca was

chosen due to the distinct differences from other parts of the country in forest and pasture

use and in the same time for his high level of emigration in Greece. Remittance income

accounts for large part of total house hold income in the district.Short surveys were undertaken in the regions of Durresi and Mirdita to compare the

differences in tradition and the actual decisions taken by the village commissions in land

use.

2. MAJOR ASPECTS OF THE METHODOLOGY

The methodology associated with the transfer lied on two major aspects:

1. The organization of the implementing structure (Forestry Village Commissions, Forest

U A i ti DFS l f t i li t d Di t t f C l


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overall picture of the communes. But the interpretation of these plot descriptions by

villagers is not an easy task.

In addition, the first operations supporting the implementation of the management

plans are giving to them their real dimension of a working document. As most of the

communal forests and pastures are much degraded, the success of first measurements

confirms the rehabilitation potential with simple actions and demonstrates the value that

the forests may have in future, if correctly managed. This is an important issue in

changing the attitude of the locals as most people lack the experience of forest growth,

and are sometimes reluctant to accept the transfer of a desert, as some said.Often taken for granted, the involvement of the DFS staff is playing a major role in

developing the transfer. But the major success of the CFPMp lies probably in the degree

of awareness amongst the rural population about the transfer process and what it implies.

The aim, the methodology and the executing bodies are to date known not only by the

population benefiting directly form the transfer, but these are also known in other

communes where the Program is not yet active. This creates a huge demand to in deeper

reforms: clarifying the legal concepts, definitions, duties, rights, obligations andresponsibilities; allowing commercial activities with communal forests and pastures

products and services; bringing more support to the protection of natural resources

(forests and soils); recognizing land property, etc.

3. STEPS FOLLOWED

To successfully achieve the overall objective of the project The preparation in

participatory way of clear guidelines and criteria on fixing and demarcating boundaries

between state owned forest and communal forest and share of the rights and


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3.2. Field surveys and establishment of contact with local people and

representatives

Working groups were established for each of the four communes under investigation.

After their familiarization with the projects objectives, the work started by collecting all

the existing documentation and other materials to be used during the field works. The

main documents used by working groups were the old forest management plans which

were found at respective Directorates of Forestry Services of the districts. For the local

unit and village boundaries, maps which include the territory of communes and the

villages were collected. The working group used the following thematic maps: Topographic maps of the scale 1:25000 or 1:10000

Agriculture cadastral maps used by the Commissions of Land Distribution

Maps of forests and pastures of the management plans or inventory

Different documents that contain earlier boundaries.

Based on these partial topographic maps, a new map was prepared containing the

following information: Local government unit and village boundaries, as they are traditionally known,

as well as based on different documents.

Agricultural land boundaries according to villages (used by the Land

Distribution Commissions), extracted by the cadastral maps or those of the Real

Estate Registration Units, to ensure compatibility between the boundaries of

forests and pastures and agriculture land, with resident areas or other territories.

Forests and pastures boundaries according to maps taken from the DFS and

local government unit defined in the preliminary agreement on the forests and

t th t th l l it t k i i hi


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leadership of FPUA; and (iii) the DFS Offices. This type of survey based on

questionnaires was focused in the districts of Korce, Elbasan, and Diber.

3.4. Building the local structures for project implementation (Commune

and village commissions)

The implementation of this project was foreseen through a participatory approach. As

such, we considered crucial the participation of local community. Thus, one of the first

steps was the establishment of local structures for project implementation which

represent the main partner of consultancy in the first stage of the transfer process. These

structures include forest and pastures commissions at commune level (responsible for

setting the boundaries villages of the same commune) and at village level (responsible for

defining the users and setting the boundaries between and within the parcels and users of

the same parcel). The commissioners were trained in one-day training, on the issues

dealing with the identification and legalization of the village boundaries on forest and

pastures, and the certification of the use and users of the forest. Commissions werecomprised of 5-7 people who represented the users groups and were elected in the general

meeting of the village.

3.5. Data collection

The aim of this process was to get a better impression on the socio-economic status of

the villagers, forest and agriculture land, forest use and the inhabitants view of forest.

The collected data included:

Geographical positions site characteristics and road infrastructure


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3.6. Demarcation of boundaries at village forest

Demarcation of village boundaries was carried out by the working groups in close

collaboration with representatives from the DSF, the village commissions, and with

boundary villages commissions. The working groups started the ascertainment with the

well-known or documented boundaries, and walked along the boundaries discussing and

marking in the field and in the map the boundary lines. After agreeing on the boundaries,

the commission and the working group filled out and signed a written agreement in

several copies for all interested parties (village, registration office, local government unit,

district cadastre, office of real estate registration and the directorate of forest service).Each copy of the written agreement was accompanied by a copy of the map with the

drawn boundaries. (See Appendices 1, 2, 3, 4 and 5)

The same procedure was followed for every village. In cases when the headman of

the village was not a member of the commission, he was always present during the

process of boundaries demarcation together with other individuals (elderly people) who

know them good enough.

3.7. Certification of users of forest and pastures

Division of the communal forests and pastures to the users was a decision taken by

the villages commissions. If they decided to divide them, users were identified and

certified by village commissions. As a rule, they collected the requests or traditional

claims of neighborhoods, clans, group families or separate families for the forests and

pastures they have used in the past, and then decided accordingly.

Two forest maps were the tools used by working groups in consultation with the

i i d i di id l i th f id tifi ti f f il th


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forest use and increase of public awareness on this process. The methodology of this

process included:

Seminar at regional level with explanation of the process.

Discussion at commune level.

Preparation and distribution of leaflets and posters at Communes offices, public

places, shops, schools etc.

Media campaign through delivery of interviews on TV, articles in newspapers etc.

Organization of National Conference on Reform in Albania Forestry.

Meeting with National Agency on Inventory and Transfer of Immovable

Properties to the Local Government Units.

Meeting with Deputy Minister of MEFWA.

Formal and Informal meeting with parliament members.

Preparation of draft for Law(s) to be amended and sending them to the

responsible Ministries.

5. SCHEDULE OF PROJECT IMPLEMENTATION

The agreement between ILC and NACFP was signed on August 1, 2006. After

signing the agreement, NACFP started to organize its human resources in National and

Local level. Implementaion of the majority of the activities followed the action plan and

schedule presented in the project proposal (see below); however, in few cases it wasreviewed and changed taking into consideration the operational timetable, political

changes and different problems faced during the project implementation.


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The activities implemented underthe Projectwere diverse and linked to specific issues such

as: assessing the ongoing process of forest and pasture transfer in region scale; selection of pilot

communes; selection of local experts on the level of district and commune; establishment of

working groups in each commune; presentation of the project to communes; establishment of

village commissions, including representatives from each stakeholder group within the

communes; training of working groups and village commissions to implement the project on the

village level; identification of current boundaries of forest and pasture transferred to the

communes; identification of traditional boundaries of the communes; identification of legal and

institutional constrains to fit in traditional boundaries; collection of the information on the

traditional use of forest and pasture; preparation and evaluation of the questionnaires for

identification traditional use of forest and pasture; defining historical and current modes of both

shared and assigned access to all resource areas; identification of the users group in each parcel

boundaries in village, through combination of topographic maps 1:25 000 with forest and

pastures cover maps; organization of regional or national workshops; advocacy and lobbying on

reviewing and/or amending certain laws and creation of legal spaces for preparation of new

regulations; etc.

1. LAND TENURE AND COMMUNAL FORESTRY

As human populations and their demands on forest resources grow, citizens and

officials search for solutions to the problems of forest degradation and deforestation.

Many factors contribute to make forests very challenging to govern effectively. Most of

these challenges emerge from the biophysical characteristics of forest resources. From

that point of view, community forestry has become a popular movement, challenging

foresters to change their thinking. The message is simple: people are the key to success


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1.1. Historical background of land tenure policiesHistorically, community forestry activities have been important to the livelihoods of

most rural people in Albania, even though formal state governments have not always

been supportive of such activities. This has a much a do with the Albanian roots.

Albanians generally trace their history back to the Illyrian tribes, which evolved from the

Stone Age to reach their power peak around 400 BC (Woods, 1918;Wallace, 1998). The

Illyrians resisted assimilation into the Roman culture, however, the roman land tenure

judicial regime was forced in plain zone (Haxhi, 1988). When the Roman Empire divided

into east and west, Albania became a part of the Byzantine Empire.

The first Byzantine agrarian law, called the Justinian law, was approved in the VII

century, later amended following the socio economic changes. Agrarian law contents one

summary of provisions arranging relations between villagers as small land owners, as

well between villagers and their overlords, and it was extended up to the IX century

(Haxhi, 1988). In the occupied part of the country the common ownership under theagricultural land started to be disorganized from the VIII century. The law provides

disintegration of the common ownership and division of it to villagers. In case of the

communions, the law defined the equal taxes for all shareholders. If any member of

communions abandoned, the others were responsible for paying his tax. Based on this

law, all the families had the right to heritage their land. In addition, they could exchange

the arable land and had the rights of leasing and to use them for agricultural products. If

someone paid taxes to the empire cashbox, he was regognised as the owner of the landeven if he was runway (Anonymous, 1978).

Prior to the end of the Byzantine time, few changes occurred on the land tenure


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land, circumscribed. Generally, the response was agricultural intensification, perhaps

through terracing and irrigation (Schon and Galaty, 2006).

As Ottoman power began to decline in the 18th century, the central authority of the

empire in Albania gave way to the local authority of autonomy-minded lords. The most

successful of these lords were three generations ofPashas of the Bushati family, who

dominated most of northern Albania from 1757 to 1831, and Ali Pasha Tepelena of

Janina (now Ionnina, Greece), who ruled over southern Albania and northern Greece

from 1788 to 1822. These Pashas created separate states within the Ottoman state until

they were overthrown by the sultan.

In 1831 Turkey officially abolished the Timar system. In the wake of its collapse,

economic and social power passed from the feudal lords to private landowning Beys and,

in the northern highlands, to tribal chieftains calledBajraktar, who presided over given

territories with rigid patriarchal societies that were often torn by blood feuds. Peasants

who were formerly serfs now worked on the estates of theBeys as tenant farmers. Land

tenure regime was based on military feudal ownership, with kanunamente (body of

Ottoman Laws based on the Kuran and the Sultans Codes, adapted especially for theoccupied part of the country, in concordance with some traditional customs). During that

time, a land inventory was performed and all the land was registered. All the land

(agricultural and other lands such as forest, pasture, meadows, rangelands), independently

from the owner, were declared as state owned. Judicially, the owner was called God

and was administered by Sultan. All the lands proclaimed Mirie. Land was distributed

according to the Ottoman feudal system, in which the holder of a Timar(estate) had to

report for military duty, bringing and supporting other soldiers. A wide range of taxes

was imposed, including the hara, a graduated poll tax on non-Muslims. The villagers

used the land called Bashtina and apart from it the villagers had the ownership right to


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ancestor thereby forming exogamous segmented clans (fisi). Several neighborhoods and

fisi together compose a single village. Political power is vested in the person of the family

patriarch (zot i shpi). Family heads are appointed or elected to a village council (kuvend)that makes decisions of importance to the whole community. A single council member is

elected headman or kryeplak. In Ottoman times, several villages and fisi might be

politically joined in a bajrak(a banner) led by a bajraktar(a banner chief ). Bajraks

formed loose tribal confederations; e.g. those of the Shala tribe joined Shosh, Shalas

nearest neighbor to the south, and several other tribes, to form the Dukagjin

confederacy (far), one of ten tribal confederations in northern Albania (Durham, 1910;

Frazer and Durham,1912; Hasluck, 1954; Kastrati, 1955; Schon and Galaty, 2006).

At the beginning of the 20th century, the land ownership system in Albania was

dominated by the iflig; land tenure system which was characteristic of the Ottoman

Empire where peasants were obliged to contribute labor and produce either for a private

landlord, for the state, or for religious institutions. After independence from the Turks in

1912, land distribution was very unequal. The vast majority of agricultural land was

controlled by five families each owning about 60,000 hectares of farmland and forests.Further, the large estates were not substantially affected by two attempts at land reform

before 1945. In July 1924 a peasant-backed insurgency won control of Tirana and Fan

Noli became Prime Minister. He set out to build a Western-style democracy, including

major land reform and modernization, but there were no funds in the treasury and no

international recognition. His approach on forest land was to divide it between local

communities to fulfill their needs, the accessed by local communitys part, and the

remaining part to be owned and managed by the state (Pollo and Puto, 1981).

Between 1925 and 1945 during the King Zogs ruling time and inter-war time, the

concentration of land ownership was only affected by the development of an embryonic


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Forest policy began with the establishment of the countrys forest service in 1923.

Those hired to fill the available positions were Albanian foresters who had studied in

Western Europe (France, Italy, and Austria). Their approach was technocratic andcentralized, shaped by the idea of the national state, which the Albanian political class

was so desperate to build during the inter-war period. To provide revenues for the state

budget, in the late 1930s, the government began giving concessions to foreign companies,

a period that marks the beginning of industrial harvest of the forests in Albania. The

unsustainable rate of removals continued during the World War II to supply the Italian

and German armies. Because of difficulties in accessibility (roads were absent and rivers

are too turbulent to transport timber) forests in the northern and central part of Albania

were spared (Fernow, 1913). However, as in other parts of the Ottoman Empire, in

central and southern Albania, deforestation continued because of neglect on the part of

the authorities. The detrimental influence of forest destruction was repeatedly experienced

in floods and droughts.

After the communists came to power (end of 1944), the technocratic legacy combined

with the communist ideology became the basis of the forest policy. In 1946, as part of theagrarian reform, all the forests in Albania were nationalized and with few exceptions, are

still state-owned. The communist government put emphasis on extraction of natural

resources, especially timber and firewood, to meet the demands of an expanding controlled

economy. The government's first major act to build socialism was swift,

uncompromising agrarian reform, which broke up the large landed estates of the southern

Beys and distributed the parcels to landless and other peasants. This destroyed the

powerful class of the Beys. Shortly after the agrarian reform, the Albanian governmentstarted to collectivize agriculture, completing the job in 1967. As a result, peasants lost

title to their land. In addition, the leadership extended the new socialist order to the more


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In October 1992 a new forest law was passed, which came into operation in 1993.

This law was passed against the advice of forest experts who argued that the new law

would lead to loss of state control and large-scale abuse. It was also fiercely contested bynorthern communes leading to several problems. Widespread absence of authoritatively

demarcated administrative and inter-village boundaries has stymied land registration and

precipitated sharp disputes, particularly between villages over pasture and grazing rights.

These problems derive in large part from misalignments between pre-1945 village

boundaries and those drawn after 1990 within communes defined according to ex-

cooperative boundaries, not those of their constituent villages in the pre-communist era.

The coexistence of state ownership of the forest and customary law usage rights as

exercised by villagers did not pose a problem where domestic wood needs were

concerned. The traditional adherence to clan boundaries enabled villagers to meet their

domestic needs more efficiently than the cumbersome official system could have done.

By contrast, the coexistence of state and customary law, once a state decree granted

certain areas of the traditionally communal forest to licensed wood fellers, was a source

of conflict. This was not because there was any real doubt as to licensees rights, butbecause sale of wood was the only means of financial survival for villagers, nearly all of

whom were unemployed. Had the original proposal put forward by the communes been

approved at the start of the 1990s, the forest might have been no less depleted, but at least

replanting and maintenance would have reduced damage (de Waal, 2004).

The alpine forests do not unfortunately enjoy this community involvement. Nor are

they protected by a state at once distant, weak and indifferent. Unscrupulous unlicensed

felling and sawmill businesses flourish, their activities large scale enough to buy them

protection from prosecution. Destruction of these forests is not the result of overlapping

rights or blurred boundaries but rather state weakness or indifference that allows people


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1.2.1. Legislature

Albania is a parliamentary democracy. The parliament (Peoples Assembly) is

unicameral. There are 15 permanent standing committees or permanent commissions thatdeal with respective laws and administrations. The committee involved in forest policy is

the Parliamentary Commission of Agriculture and Food. Although almost all political

parties have expressed concern about environmental degradation, low priority is given to the

resolution of the problem. The two parties that have run on an environmental platform, the

Agrarian Ecological Party and the Green Party, are too small to have a significant impact on

forest policies.

Despite this generally grim picture, the parliament is a very important participant in

the forest policy process, especially at the current transitional stage when every law of the

land is going through radical change. Considering the constraints, the role of the

legislature with regard to forest and pastures was categorized as positive by most

interviewees, but they had expressed concerns about the implementation of the laws

already passed. Forest policy-makers must be aware that the parliament is a complex

institution. Deputies come from a variety of backgrounds and have distinct motivationsand characteristics. Some of them are more adept at forest technical issues than others.

Loyalty to the party remains the most important factor in the decision-making process of

the Albanian legislators. Other factors influencing voting decisions include parochialism,

personal beliefs/goals, and nepotism.

1.2.2. Judiciary

The judicial system consists of district courts, six courts of appeal, and the Supreme

Court. The Constitutional Court (a separate body) reviews cases requiring interpretation


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that rely less on judiciary would be preferable. Some situations where it is appropriate to

avoid the involvement of the courts on forestry issues (adopted from Horowitz 1977) are:

Cases where there is insufficient incentive for the parties in question to abide

and implement a courts ruling

Cases in which it will be very difficult to determine what would happen after

the ruling

Forestry issues that are rapidly changing and have yet to be addressed by the

legal system

Narrow issues and low stakes.

1.2.3. Administration

The Council of Ministers is the highest institution responsible for the implementation of

policies by directing and controlling the activity of ministries and other state agencies. The

sector of forest and pastures acts under the auspices of the Ministry of Environment,

Forestry and Water Administration.

The local government consists of 12 prefectures, set up after the French model, but is

still frail following four decades of communist abrogation. Each prefecture is divided into

districts, which were the major administrative divisions during the communist regime.

Districts are further subdivided into cities and communes. The average area of communes is

9 000 ha and covers, on average, about nine villages. District, city, and commune councils

are elected by popular vote, but rely on the central government for funding, because theirpower to impose taxes has remained only on paper.

Although communes are administrative divisions, the central government and


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1.3. Land tenure policy(ies)Since 1991, Albania has pursued a process of land and property reform. The main

elements of state administrative reforms have included:

organization of new units of administration to regulate and manage

agricultural lands, forests and pastures, urban development lands and properties,

and tourism-development lands and projects

division of state-owned lands and properties between direct state agency

control and municipal ownership or right of use

incorporation of new concepts and procedures of environmental regulation

and environmental impact assessment

re-organization of related administrative systems, including local property

taxation, mortgage and finance mechanisms and valuation.

Over the last 16 years, substantial progress has been made in carrying forward the

civil law reforms and the programs of ownership transfer. Almost all families and some

juridical persons have received documentation giving ownership rights in land and

housing units, and most families and enterprises now occupy and use their land premises.

On the state side, progress in establishing the new administrative structure of regulation

and management of land has been slow because of the need to bring new concepts and

methodologies into the law and administrative practice. This has required re-training, re-

organization and public outreach. It has also required transfers of power and resources.The next stages of reform, therefore, will need to confront these problems of mismatch

between the revised structures and laws, on paper, and functions and practice on the


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Agricultural fields (arable land), previously controlled by collective and state farms,

were to be divided into plots of equal size/value and distributed to the collective

members and farm employees in family ownership (" No. 7501; Law No. 8053). Alegal document (deed) called tapi gives evidence of ownership in the name of the

"head of household."

Families that were owners of land and property prior to 1945 have been able to

claim restitution of their non-agricultural properties, or alternatively to receive other

property or financial compensation (Law No. 7698; Law No. 9235).

State and municipal ownership also is distinguished among several land usecategories. In rural areas, these encompass forest, pasture and water-related lands (Law

No. 7623;Law No. 7917; Law No. 8093). In addition, the state has retained some land of

former state farms, "refused" agricultural lands (lands that eligible families have rejected)

(Law No. 8047). All state-owned properties are subject to inventory and a process of

division in which municipal governments may acquire ownership or right of use (Law

No. 8743; Law No. 8744). In particular, communes administration are acquiring control

of forests and pastures, located close to the villages, for subordinate use by theirresidents. Taken together, programs of creating private property rights, state properties

and illegal actions have subdivided Albania into 4.5 million land parcels and separately-

owned immovable property units.

1.4.1. The status of inventory and transfer of state properties

The process of determining state-owned land and property holdings and their division

between state agencies and municipalities has been under way since 2001, but is being

completed slowly than expected. This process has been managed by the State Agency for


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1.4.2. Unresolved policy issues

As noted above, several reform programs have made substantial progress, but no

program is completed and unresolved policy issues remain. National Strategy for Socialand Economic Development (NSSED) is the main policy document of this framework,

giving guidance to subordinate, sector plans and strategies and to the formulation of

budgets (Ministry of Finance, 2004).

Reform of land and property has not been the subject of its own comprehensive

policy document. However, the main elements of land reform transition to civil law and

market relations, modern management of state lands and properties, environmentally

sustainable use of land resources are found in various parts of the inter-related policy

documentation. For example, the "Green Strategy for agricultural development and the

strategies for poverty reduction in rural and mountain areas emphasize the completion of

land reform as a way to support citizen welfare and economic opportunities (World Bank,

2004).

1.4.3. Restitution of property rights to former owners

The unresolved issue of restitution/compensation has been the major obstacle

preventing completion of tenure reform. The debate over the restitution of agricultural

land began in 1993 when the original Law No. 7698 exempted this category. The law

provided that former owners whose grant provided by the Law No. 7501 was not equal to

their ancestral property rights could be compensated either by an alternative grant of land

or else by a financial entitlement.

Continued delay in resolving the restitution and compensation issues causes a circular

dilemma hindering land and property rights in many regions On one side the number


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authority of local governments to levy taxes on land and buildings, including on

agricultural land. Also subject to local taxation is the transfer of the right of ownership in

immovable property and the hookup of a new building to infrastructure.

1.4.5. Rural land administration

In rural areas, there has been an effort to consolidate the regulation and management

of the different regimes of law covering agricultural fields, pastures and meadows,

forests, lands related to water bodies, and specially-protected lands into two systems.

Two hierarchical administrative structures have been created. Under the auspices of

Ministry of Agriculture and Food which deals mainly with agricultural lands, a two-level

structure for Land Administration and Protection has been created (Law No. 8752; CoM,

2002). Within the Ministry, the sections of Land Management and Land Protection

operate in 12 offices under regional (qark) supervision, and 36 Land Management and

Protection Offices are linked to the communal administrations.

Forest Directorate operates under auspices of the Ministry of Environment, Forestryand Water Administration. The directorate has jurisdiction over (1) the upland forests and

pastures remaining in direct state control, (2) communal forests and pastures, and (3)

specially protected areas. The Forest Directorate has field personnel in 36 district and 103

local offices called forest sectors, while a separate unit of Forest Police has inspection

and enforcement powers. At Ministerial level, this structure deals with private, state and

communal lands without distinction in methodology.

The tasks of management and regulation of the two organizations are much the same.

In the case of the regional Forest Directorate, Sections create the management plans for

the areas within their direct jurisdiction and they negotiate, finalize and archive the


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The critical elements of the land management system are the methodologies for data

collection and analyziation and maintaining the cadastres. The Land Administration and

Protection staff are expected to study and record information on the physical attributes ofland; in particular, its fertility.This should distinguish their work from the IPRS, which

assembles legal data, and from the Forest Directorate, which is primarily concerned with

resources (flora and fauna) rather than land. In practice, of course, there is overlap,

duplication of effort and competition for data sources and "customers." The

methodologies for land management remain the Communist-era techniques of "bonitimi"

measurementthat is, the assembly of indicators of soil fertility, moisture and productive

capacity as the basis for the resource valuation of land. In theory, these methodologies

allow accurate guidance to be given on farming and forestry practiceschoice of crops,

rotation schedules, fertilization, thinning, etc.and on projects and programs to prevent

degradation and enhance soil quality. They also allow the fixing of baseline conditions in

the cadastre, against which the results of subsequent inspections can be measured, for

enforcement purposes.

Recent evaluation of the capabilities of the Cadastre office in the Directorate ofForest and Pasture Policies in the MEFWA and the Land Administration and Protection

agencies under the Ministry of Agriculture and Food and Consumer Protection highlights

skepticism about the effectiveness of their methodologies and a need to build the

capability of the administrative staff.

1.5. Progress on land reform in AlbaniaThe situation of rural land and property relations remains in transition with competing

fundamental policies, land rights and administrative status defined in categorical terms;


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agreements of ownership transfer, leasehold and rights of use had several

restrictions and were conditional. More recently, with introduction of such

principles as sustainable development and biodiversity protection, the policiesenvision a multi-faceted system of management, planning and regulation. Rather

than strict division of categorized lands, the new management and regulatory

strategies involved areas such as wetlands, watersheds, coastal zones, in which

several types of land and multiple resources co-exist and development is to be

balanced with preservation, conservation and limited use (Ministry of the

Environment, 2002).

Most recently, a new policy strategy of poverty reduction has emerged in response

to studies that have measured the impacts of other policies on rural families,

children, women and society in general (World Bank, 2003). Such studies have

found that for many families, the size, location and quality of their agricultural

holdings is inadequate and they are unable to benefit from the resources of forests,

pasture and other lands controlled by the state. Rural family well-being is also

linked, through migration, to the status of land and property holdings in urban areasand to international economic relations.

These various policies found in difereent plans and strategies, are being adopted by

the government to guide rural development and its evolving relationships with the

European Union and other international organizations. Strategy for Agricultural

Development (called the "Green Strategy") incorporates most of the contemporary

principles for balanced development, environmental protection and preservation in rural

areas (UNECE, 2000). At the detailed level in particular laws, regulations, administrative

processes and practice, these competing policies have not been reconciled. The

fundamental structure of categorized law and administration continues to be the


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lands. Generally, this land encompasses mountain fields, remote from villages, and poor

quality, terraced hillsides, which have been degraded by erosion. This land remains under

state ownership with control exercised by the Ministry of Environment, Forestry andWater Administration of the Ministry of Agriculture and Food (Law No. 8047).

Communal administrations have taken control of this land by right of use (Law No.

8312). In the process of inventory and transfer of state lands, the communes will take

ownership of these lands, with power to transfer them into private ownership or into

subordinate rights of use by citizens. The refused lands may also be available for transfer

in restitution or as alternative land grants to fulfill restitution claims.

Before deciding on the status of refused lands, it is necessary to inventory and assess

their quality, value and suitability for use. The law prohibits any sale or lease of these

lands prior to the determination of restitution claims, for which some of this land may

provide alternative land grants to satisfy restitution claims (Law No. 8312). After

determination of the restitution claims, these lands will become available for re-

distribution or sale to rural families. Since the quality of most of these lands is poor,

however, it is unclear whether rural families will want to take ownership and controlunless changes are made in the status of these lands. It may be necessary to re-categorize

some of these lands from agricultural to pasture or forest, or to categories of land for

housing or other development. If they remain in agricultural designation, it may be

necessary to exempt the land from taxation, reflecting its low productivity.

1.5.3. Pastures and meadowsThe Law No. 7917 For Pastures and Grazing Lands, based on their

ownership/control, subdivides these land areas into three categories:


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villagers (Law No. 7917).The same law specifies that a commune or municipality must

manage the pastures under its control accordingly to the management plan. The commune

is obliged to monitor the condition of the pastures, periodically assess their carryingcapacity, and register changes in the pasture use and conditions in the cadastre. A small

amount of pastures has been transferred to private ownership in the program of

restitution.

In practice, the regime of common use of pastures does not appear to be effectively

managed and conflicting policies are evident. The Ministry of Agriculture and Food has

reported that the total amount of pastureland is insufficient to supply the fodder needs of

all the livestock and that forest resources are being used to fill up the gap. Seen from the

perspective of food supply and agribusiness, the Ministry reports the substantial increase

in livestock as a positive trend (MOAF, 2002; IFDC, 2004). From the standpoint of

environmental quality and resource protection, there is significant concern about the

deterioration of the pastures from overgrazing, the resulting soil erosion and the removal

of forest cover to expand grazing lands.

1.5.4. Forests

The Law No. 7623 For Forests and Forest Police, subdivides the forests into three

categories:

state forests, owned and managed by state

state forests, owned by the state and given in use to communes and municipalities

for the common use of their residents; and

forests on privately owned land.


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Meadows and Law No. 7623 For Forests and Forest Police and resulted in the

transfer of lands to communes and municipalities by right of use. It is anticipated that, in

the process of inventory and transfer of state owned lands under the Law No. 8744, therights of use will be transformed into ownership rights. However, based on the provisions

of Law No. 8743, this land will remain classified as public use properties and will not be

eligible for subsequent sale in ownership to families, individuals or enterprises by the

local administrations. It appears that the communes and municipalities will continue to

offer subordinate rights of common usage, leases or rights of use, as provided in the Law

No. 7917 For Pastures and Meadows and Law No. 7623 For Forests and Forest

Police.

The same process, overseen by the Ministry of Environment, Forestry and Water

Administration, has been used to transfer both forests and pastures to communal and

municipal control. In the "Green Strategy" the goal has been set to transfer 40 percent of

all forests (ca. 400,000 hectares) and 60 percent of all pastures (244,000) hectares to the

communes and municipalities (CoM, 1999). The procedure has involved the following

stages: The technical staff of the Forest Directorate works with the communal or municipal

officers to define the size and boundary lines of areas to be assigned to the

commune as a whole and to each village within it. This involves careful technical

work and negotiation. The historic traditions of families and clans in different

villages are taken into account, along with the recent changes in village and

communal administrative borders, as well as assessments of the topographic and

ecological situation and the boundary lines of private and state lands. The terms and

conditions of the right of use, by which the commune or municipality takes

possession and control of the lands is worked out These agreements provide a 10-


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categories. This work was carried forward in 2000, with the adoption by the government

of the National Strategy on Biodiversity (CoM, 2000).

Ownership of land within the protected zones can encompass private and stateownership; however, in most of the sub-categories, the land has been kept under state

ownership and most often falls into the categories of forests and pastures. The

jurisdictional authority and procedures for administration of these areas is defined in the

Law No. 8906 (For Protected Areas). It requires that each zone be managed by an

Administrative Unit, which is defined by a Council of Ministers decree. Generally, the

broad policies and regimes of land use in these areas are set by the MEFWA which is

also responsible for the administration and management of these territories.

Representatives of local government and civil society organizations can also be elected

members of the Administrative Unit. Article 15 of this law (Law No. 8906), provides that

the MEFWA or the local government, in cooperation with third parties, may draft a

management plan for each zone. The plans should contain the objectives of protection,

mechanisms of regulation and management, and permitted activities within the area.

1.5.7. Village lands and properties

Within the village boundary lines, houses with accompanying garden plots have been

transferred into ownership of their residential occupants. This has taken place by the

preparation of an inventory and list of house owners in each village, prepared in

accordance with a special decree of the Council of Ministers (CoM, 1995). Trade and

service lands are susceptible to ownership by their tenant enterprises or other juridicalpersons under the programs of "privatization," however, few such transfers of land

ownership have taken place. Vacant village land, designated for trade and services or


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income. Based on the statistics, the Ministry has defined three groups of farms by their

production capacities. The first category comprises 21% of all farms and those are the

small farms insufficient to meet family subsistence needs. These farms produce cerealsand livestock forage but they are located in remote areas and have no opportunity to link

to markets. These farms are a primary source of migrating families. The second category

included farms that provide subsistence for families with some potential to generate

profits from sale of products. This category constitutes 64 percent of the total number of

farms. These have a more mixed production, but remain dominated by cereal and

livestock forage crops. The third category, market oriented farms, constitutes 15 percent.

These tend to be involved in vegetable, livestock and orchard/vineyard/olive production.

Table 1. Structure of Agricultural Land Holding, 2002

Farm groups Number of farms Percentage

0.1-0.5 hectare 142,600 33.9

0.5-1 hectare 101,600 24.2

1-2 hectare 126,200 30.1

Above 2 hectare 19,600 11.8

Total farm units 420,000 100%

Source: MoAF (2002).

Based on the statistics of the Ministry, the active use of cultivated land has declinedsince 1998 but there is more intensive use of the land, accounting for the increase in

production of vegetables, milk, eggs and other crops. Two are the main reasons causing


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substantial property transfer tax, this has discouraged formal, legal transactions (World

Bank, 2002).

The reluctance of farm families to engage in any long-term arrangements - sale, lease,exchange of fields - has been confirmed in several studies in which farmers and their

families have been interviewed. In the long term, it appears inevitable that young people

will continue to migrate out of the village and, over time, will lose their emotional and

social security ties to the land. In the short to medium term it appears that the best

strategy may be to help families gain income from off-farm activities- forestry, tourism,

handicraft industries. These activities require the completion of the programs of forest

and pasture land transfer and the evolution of stronger legal and economic mechanisms to

guarantee families stable, long-term access to resources and clarification of their rights,

responsibilities and costs.

1.5.9. Inventory and transfer of state properties

The program of inventory and transfer of state properties to local governmentsreflects the policies of improved state management and decentralization of authority to

local governments, which the national administration of Albania has elaborated in several

domestic and international policy documents. In 2000, Albania became a signatory of the

European Charter of Local Self Government. The Council of Ministers has adopted the

Strategy on Decentralization and Local Autonomy (World Bank, 2004b). This strategy is

a subordinate policy document to the National Strategy on Social and Economic

development, in which the principle of decentralization is stated (CoM, 2002c).Decentralization of authority and the transfer of assets to municipal level governments is

a key commitment of the government in its European Stabilization (EU, 2004). The basic


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for agriculture, commerce, industry, and housing or are otherwise not needed for state

functions. This land and properties have an equal juridical regime with private

property. Law No. 8744 provides the conditions for the transfer of the public properties,which fulfill local government functions, and the transfer of most categories of the non-

public lands to communal and municipal control.

In the framework of the Forestry Project, the fourth national inventory of forests and

pastures resources (the last inventory has been carried out in 1985) has taken place. In

this framework, an analysis of the status and trends in resource use across the country has

been performed. The inventory provided the government with an invaluable tool to assist

in planning for sustainable management of the forests and pastures and development

policies. The project established a geographical information system (GIS) to support the

forest management planning process. Agreement on how best to institutionalize, update

and maintain the national inventory and the GIS need to be further elaborated.

The process of inventory of state owned land and immovable property is described in

Law No. 8743, while the transfer of properties to the local governments is described in

the Law No. 8744. For administrative purposes, the two procedures have been combined.In order to oversee the tasks and set the standards, the Council of Ministers has

established the Agency for Inventory and Transfer of Public Property, a subdivision of

the Ministry of Public Order. The agency is in charge of supervising the work of the

communal and municipal administrations, which are responsible of carrying out the

inventories and identifying the properties subject to transfer. The larger municipalities

have set up specialized planning units to carry out this task.

The inventory and transfer of land and immovable property to municipal administrations

is a nine-stage process:

Th il h i f ll i i hi i i Thi


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The State Committee prepares the draft decision on the division of the properties

and returns the list to the commune.

In the commune, the list is publicaly displayed for 90 days to receive objections orcorrections.

The division of properties is approved by the Council of Ministers.

Registration of the immovable properties in the IPRS.

The law originally set a timetable of two years for the completion of the process,

however, implementation has moved slowly. The State Committee for Inventory and

Transfer of State Property was organized only in 2002. By May 2007, this work wasunderway in 353 communes and cities and 160 had obtained the Council of Ministers

decree (CMD) on approval of the inventory lists of local government units. In 50 of these

are approved the preliminary list and in 12 is approved the final list. About 80% of land

and other property objects are inventoried in all the country.

Several reasons have been given for the slow progress. First, it appears that the State

Committee has given priority to working with the ministries, clarifying their property

claims and has delayed working with the local governments. On their part, many local

governments have been reluctant to push for the transfer of properties on which there has

been deferred maintenance for many years (Urban Institute, 2003). Because of this, it

appears to be a substantial flaw in the process. Many communes, municipalities and the

State Committee are carrying out the inventories on the basis of data taken from the

different ministries. Inventory working groups in most communes work with the records

provided by the rural land administration office of MoAF. Since these records werecompiled prior to first registration, they do not contain the accurate boundary lines of

properties, fixed and coordinated with survey points, or the code numbers assigned to


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1.6. Communal forestry [(from the top to the bottom: Ministry, DFS,Communes, Villages (fshati), Neighborhood (mehalla), Clan (fisi),

Household (shpija)]Community forestry was initially defined, by FAO, as any situation which intimately

involves local people in a forestry activity. It embraces a spectrum of situations ranging

from woodlots in areas which are short of wood and other forest products for local needs,

through the growing of trees at the farm level to provide cash crops and the processing of

forest products at the household, artisan or small industry level to generate income, to the

activities of forest dwelling communities (FAO 1978).

While this definition focuses more on the fulfilment of needs of local people, Burley,

(2007) says: "Community forestry, social forestry and rural development forestry are

more or less equivalent and reflect Abraham Lincoln's view of democracy - government

of the people, by the people, for the people". Seeing as such

enhancing tenure security in albanian forest land

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