Top Biz News

Law to expose illegal land deal

By Fu Jing (China Daily)
Updated: 2006-08-01 08:53

A set of governmental measures to expose rampant illegal land acquisitions took effect today.

The central government has required that commercial land should be bid and auctioned nationwide. Previously, several provinces and municipalities had employed such market-based practices.

The new regulations, released by the Ministry of Land and Resources, stipulated that all land for business, tourism, recreation, commercial property and other profitable purposes should be transferred through public bidding and auctions.

"The process and final results of bidding and auctions should also be made public," the ministry spokesman said yesterday. "Land transaction will be transparent and be monitored by the public."

However, market-based practices in China are still in an embryonic stage. In most regions, the government has transferred land through negotiation with investors, which led to rampant corruption.

The ministry's statistics indicated that the government transferred 163,000 hectares of land nationwide last year, but only 35 per cent of it was dealt through bidding and auctions. The ministry considered this an achievement, representing an increase from 14.5 per cent in 2002.

However, the researchers blamed the ministry for its slow action in stepping up the regulations.

"The government has regarded curbing fast land supply as a solution to stop frenzied investment for a long time, but the concrete measures came out so late," a researcher surnamed Lin with the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences told China Daily.

The ministry's spokesman also acknowledged some irregularities in old practices of land transactions. For example, some local governments withheld information concerning the land, lay obstacles for some bidders and even use underhanded deals to transfer land.

"The problems have existed for several years, resulting in some negative effects," said Lin.

Lin cited corruption, a growing landless population, overinvestment and a decline in the amount of arable land as already having challenged the central government due to lax land management.

China had 122 million hectares of arable land last year, down from 130 million hectares in 1996. According to the ministry, it needs at least 106.7 million hectares of cultivated land to feed its theoretical peak population of 1.6 billion in 2030.

The central government has already realized the irregularities. Recently, it urged the establishment of nine land inspection bureaux nationwide to strengthen supervision of land acquisition.

Premier Wen Jiabao expressed concerns last week that too much land has come to real-estate development, the transfer cost of land for industrial purposes is still low and illegal occupation is still rampant.

"Much stricter measures must be employed to curb the trend," Wen said.