1. Land Administration and Management in Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia
Meskerem Brhane, David Mason, Olga Kaganova, Geoff Payne and Chinzorig Batbileg
Annual World Bank Land and Poverty Conference
March 2015

2. Purpose and Context of Report
UB’s population and built area have greatly expanded during a period of economic growth
City has been exploring ways of improving financial management, creditworthiness
Parallel work examining urban service delivery and municipal expenditures
How can urban land be used as a resource for the infrastructure investments and enhancing quality of life?

3. Overview of Presentation
UB’s population and built area have greatly expanded during a period of economic growth
This has negatively impacted the quality of life for many urban residents
Despite all of the investment and expansion of the built area, land administration and management have not kept pace
The city has likely foregone substantial revenues because of this
Overview of recommendations for UB

4. Background: Mongolia in Transition
Transition to democracy and market economy
All land was state owned
Use of land for private purposes is now allowed
Land ownership by Mongolian Citizens
Land possession by private and state entities
Land use by foreign entities
Land management and administration practices, and related legislation are totally new

5. “Survey” of Urban Land Issues
Land Administration Issues:
Tenure
Land ownership for all Mongolians (good for low income housing)
Land Use and Planning
Uncoordinated & poorly planned land use and development
Cadaster and Registry
Poor land administration capacity, procedures and systems
Land disputes, challenges to land & property titles
Taxation and Value Capture
Active and profitable land and property market (known to all but the city
Land Management:
Poor records of publicly owned land
Loss of public land from “carvings”
Lack of land for public use
The land privatization policy enabled secure and affordable land available at a scale and speed consistent with demand, but on the other hand UB cannot provide the population with basic social and engineering infrastructure
low-density growth of ger areas makes the costs of public infrastructure, such as roads, high, while heating and sewerage to these areas would require public capital and ongoing operating expenses at a level so prohibitive that they often cannot be provided at all. For example, a 2009 World Bank study estimating infrastructure costs found that water connections would cost between US$4,500 and US$11,500 per household with heating connections between US$2,000 and US$8,000 per household (World Bank 2010). A more recent World Bank survey estimates that 52.3 percent of ger households earn US$3,243 (MNT 6 million) or less per year (World Bank 2014a), suggesting the connection costs for these two services alone are far out of the ability of many ger households to pay.

6. Existing Policies Encourage Low Density
Entitlement of large free plots with little taxation result in low density residential areas
Zoning that separates residential use from commercial use and discourages mixed land uses result in:
People having to travel long distances to meet their daily needs of jobs, education, food etc.
Increases burden on roads and contributes to traffic congestion
Master Plan promotes expansion of city without regard to the cost of per capita infrastructure provision

7. New growth is mostly low-density expansion
Between 2000 and 2013:
87% of all new expansion has occurred in the form of low density development
2013
69 percent of the entire built up area of UB is low density ger area development. Since 2000, 87 percent of land developed as been this type of built up are

8. Ulaanbaatar has low density by international standards
Low average density compared to other East Asian cities of similar size
Among 869 EAP cities with a population over 100K, UB ranks 748 in terms of density of BUILT UP AREAS
Average
Source: ‘East Asia’s Changing Urban Landscape’, World Bank 2014

9. Infrastructure has not kept up with the city’s expansion
PAVED ROADS This slide shows the total number of paved roads as a share of urban area in UB compared to other cities in the region, including cities of a similar population such as
UB has the lowest density of paved roads out of the whole sample size. Cities like Danang, Singapore and Hong Kong, of comparable built-up urban areas, surpass UB’s road density by 3, 4 and 7 times.

10. And there are more cars using limited road space
VEHICLES TO KM PAVED ROADS RATIO UB’s vehicles to km paved roads ratio is comparatively high, particularly when ‘motorbike cities’ are excluded.

11. Which increases average commute times
Beijing
Bangkok
Manila
Shanghai
Ulaanbaatar
Jakarta
Cebu
Wuhan
Singapore
Seoul
Hong Kong
Ho Chi Minh
While UB has the fourth smallest built-up urban area, it has one of the longest average commute times in the sample of its peer cities
Ha Noi
Da Nang

12. Transit coverage centers on the central city

13. Proximity to Amenities and Location Drives Land Prices

14. Dimensions of Residential Land Markets
City’s built area is dominated by khashaas and low density growth
Limited penetration of formal credit (less than 10 percent)
Plots have limited value for collateral
Avoid price reporting
Little information about prices, volumes, submarkets

15. Control of Public Land Lack of strategic land management
Lack of strategy and coordination results in shortages of land for public use
“Carve outs,” lack of protected land for new streets in city centre or schools in ger areas
Excessive land holdings:
- About 2,500 individuals hold close to 6,000 m2 each for household use
- Do budgetary organizations need 5.9 hectares each and NGOs hectares each?
Forgone revenues from land allocations => non-transparent land allocation – direct allocations

16. What is public land used for?
Inventory of the public land was carried out, but it still does not provide crucial information
Inventorying of public land was carried out, but it still does not provide decision makers with simple yet critical information such as the current balance of land possessed by government entities and its allocation for various uses, or the amount of buildable land still vacant within built areas.

17. Land Management and Administration Practices
The databases at PRD are at best incomplete and at worst inaccurate
The databases at the Cadastral Division of the Property Relations Department (PRD) that contain information on municipal land parcels are at best incomplete and at worst inaccurate. It is also unclear if records are updated in a timely manner when land holdings change. There are delays in land registration and cases of encroachment on public land. For example, a sample cadaster map (figure 3.1) for the National Drama Theatre does not identify the parcel that has been carved out for a commercial tower currently under construction behind the theatre. The land parcels of 710 city and city-owned entities are partially included in these databases, and these organizations have possession rights over the land they occupy.

18. Looking to the Future

19. The Master Plan could extend existing problems
Aims to disperse rather than concentrate population (satellite cities)
Does not dedicate adequate space for mix land uses
Costs for full implementation far exceeds available resources
Existing tax and fee structures for land preclude value capture
Satellite cities will add more congestion, commute times, infrastructure costs
UN Recommends 40 percent of land should be available for mixed uses
UB Budget: 400 billion MNT, expected cost of plan 34 trillion

20. Conclusions and Recommendations

21. Key Conclusions
UB is undergoing a historic transformation toward market-driven urban development, but the process has its internal imbalances:
Market forces already value land according to its location and infrastructure amenities
Free access to land for residents, budgetary institutions, NGOs, and other land users led to low-density urban expansion and overall overconsumption of land by various land holders
The Master Plan exposes UB to risks of non-sustainable spatial

22. Key Conclusions, cont’d
2. UB has the street system that is dramatically insufficient for its needs
“Better” streets rather than “more” streets
3. Significant foregone public revenue from potential land value capture:
Land and property holders have been paying very low property tax and land fee, if at all (for example, owners of apartment not paying property tax at all)
Land for commercial activities was allocated free-of-charge or at low administrative prices
The forgone revenue issue can be addressed for going forward, as outlined in recommendations

23. Key Conclusions, cont’d
4. However, the current efforts face three key sets of constrains:
Existing national laws and regulations that limit UB’s power to establish taxes and fees
Still conflicting perceptions about land as a designated public entitlement for residential use
Flaws in the land management and administration system, such as (i) lack of strategic direction, (ii) insufficient transparency, and (iii) missing critical elements of land administration infrastructure

24. Key Recommendations, Short Term
1. Begin developing an explicit land management policy and strategy for publicly owned land, by a special and temporary Task Force
Members from different departments, district level governments
Develop long-term comprehensive land management strategy and practices
Review existing practices and procedures to reduce fragmentation in land administration and management
Complete inventory of public lands
Determine which vacant public lands to retain for future public use, which to release to the private sector; which to retain for future determination

25. Key Recommendations, Short Term
2. Some priority actions to pursue, cont’d
Enhance city’s budget revenues by capturing land value of newly allocated land through using auctions as the main instrument of allocating good-quality vacant land to the private sector
Introduce new procedures for good-quality auctions of land and other ways of land allocation
Create and use a separate budgetary fund to collect revenues from privatization of land rights (e.g. land privatization, allocation of possession rights) for capital investment purposes

26. A framework for sorting out municipal land
All municipal land
Land for current and future public uses
Land that can be allocated for private uses
Land that can be allocated for private uses
Sites in less valuable locations
Sites in valuable locations
“Golden reserve” for future auctions
For auctions only
Can be allocated via other mechanisms (e.g. lottery)

27. Key Recommendations, Short Term
3. Start engaging the population, businesses, and the civil society in open and evidence-based discussion of land-related challenges that UB faces and choices and changes ahead

28. Key Recommendations, Longer Term
4. Conduct “audits” on land held by individuals with large land parcels / holdings, budgetary organizations, and NGOs, in order to identify excess land and re-possess it to the city for further release on the market or charge market price for it

29. Key Recommendations, Longer Term, cont’d
5. Explore further land value capture via two internationally tested instruments:
A. Market-based property / land tax
Example: A modest market-value based tax on non-residential buildings can generate 16% of UB’s 2012 budget; a similarly modest, market-value based property tax on apartments can generate 18% of the UB’s 2012 budget
B. Land Development Fee
A one-time charge paid by everybody before they may start construction, with revenues spent on infrastructure; used in Europe, the US, and former Soviet countries

30. Key Recommendations, Longer Term
6. Regulatory and administrative reform related to land:
Streamline procedures for obtaining and transferring land and property and construction permits (in partnership with GASR and ALAGaC)
Improve interdepartmental coordination and sharing of information and databases (PRD and Tax Office)
Review and revise existing land regulations to support density and diversity of land uses, access to transit

31. Key Recommendations, Longer Term
7. Pursue legal reform at the national level for
Improving the investment climate by reforming the current land tenure laws
Eventually reconsidering the current practice of allocating low-cost urban land for residential use in current form,
It is not compatible with more sustainable, environmentally and economically feasible urban environment that provides modern quality of life