Whose land acquisition brings better social benefits?

Which method?

The provisions on land acquisition, compensation, support and resettlement in the draft revised Land Law are provisions that greatly affect people's lives and the social security system, and there are still different opinions. Among them, there are conflicting opinions on the method of land acquisition.

Who reclaims land for socio -economic development projects? The State reclaims land and organizes compensation and resettlement. Or let people and businesses negotiate. Which method brings better social impact and benefits?

Prof. Dr. Hoang Van Cuong: Land acquisition compensation must ensure better housing and livelihoods than the old place. Photo: Quochoi.vn

National Assembly delegate - Prof. Dr. Hoang Van Cuong chose the method of land recovery by the State. He said: "I think that for socio-economic development investment projects in accordance with land use planning, the State will recover land, with the participation of the people in developing a compensation plan, providing appropriate resettlement support, with the consensus of the majority of the people, which will bring long-term stable benefits to the people and bring about better social impacts than letting the people and businesses negotiate on their own."

If we choose the method of letting people and businesses negotiate by themselves, there may be 3 consequences, according to Professor Hoang Van Cuong.

Firstly, during the period of Industrialization and Urbanization, urban housing development projects and production and business all took agricultural land from farmers. In fact, investors bought agricultural land by negotiating with people at low prices. Then they turned the project into urban land, built houses and sold them at many times higher prices.

This policy is giving investors a privilege to enjoy increased value from land use conversion, benefiting some people who intentionally cause difficulties and pressure businesses to receive high prices.

The second consequence is that people who sell their land only receive money, and are not supported in changing their careers or creating jobs after losing their land. There are no jobs, all the compensation money is spent, their livelihoods are lost, and many social consequences arise.

Third, not all people have the capacity to negotiate and reach agreements with investors, so they are easily led by groups of people who collude with investors to their disadvantage. Some people deliberately refuse to accept to force investors to pay unusually high prices. This will be the cause of lawsuits, compared with the compensation levels of projects where the state reclaims land, continuing to give rise to prolonged lawsuits.

In particular, if someone does not accept the agreement, the socio-economic development investment project must stop, land resources are wasted because they are not put into use according to the project's purpose more effectively, and the State's approved land use plan is not implemented. "This is a failure because the State gives up the right to allocate and reclaim land so that people can negotiate on their own," said Professor Hoang Van Cuong.

Land acquisition and cash compensation are not enough

Regarding land acquisition and compensation policies, according to Professor Hoang Van Cuong, compensation policies that only pay people whose land is acquired are not enough. There must be support and resettlement policies to ensure that people have housing and livelihoods equal to or better than their old place. And people who have to relocate must have their housing but not have much change in social factors.

If it is not possible to resettle on the spot, the most favorable housing construction site must be reserved for the resettlement area construction project. Avoid the situation where localities often reserve the most favorable site for auction to collect money, while the resettlement site is often in a less favorable location.

According to Professor Hoang Van Cuong, compensation policies that only pay people whose land is recovered are not enough. There must be support and resettlement policies to ensure that people have housing and livelihoods equal to or better than their old place. Illustrative photo.

And infrastructure standards for resettlement areas must be specified. In urban areas, resettlement areas must have infrastructure at a higher level than the urban level of the old residence. If in rural areas, the infrastructure of resettlement areas must follow the advanced new rural construction standards, and if in urban areas, the infrastructure standards must be higher than the urban level where people must relocate.

If the recovered accommodation is worth less than the standard accommodation price at the resettlement site, people will receive new, better accommodation without having to pay extra.

Professor Cuong suggested that compensation policies should be legalized to better restore housing and livelihoods for people whose land was recovered, not just stopping at calculating compensation. In addition to compensation, people should be supported to have new jobs, with income equal to or higher than the income from recovered land.

“People have given up their land to build national security and defense projects, and develop the economy and society for the national and public interest, so those whose land has been recovered must be given better conditions than the existing conditions to compensate for their contributions to the development of the projects,” said Professor Cuong.

And in the projects, a significant area must be set aside to build houses for rent or for sale so that people whose land is recovered can have jobs. The compensation policy must also form a fund with money contributed to the insurance fund or long-term deposits in the bank so that people who are past working age and cannot change their career can receive monthly payments. The amount received must not be lower than the income from the recovered land.

Regarding the land recovery mechanism, Professor Hoang Van Cuong proposed 3 methods. Method 1: Land recovery for projects serving security, national defense, and construction of public works: The State decides to recover land without consulting the people, but must obtain the consensus of the majority of the people on the compensation and resettlement plan. The majority is understood to be more than 50%.

Method 2: Implementing the self-negotiation mechanism (Article 127 of the draft Law), only applies in 3 cases: (1) land purchase and sale and transfer relationships do not require the State to approve or accept investment projects; (2) projects in which people contribute land to jointly invest in business; (3) projects in which people self-readjust urban land.

Method 3: Land recovery for investment in socio-economic development projects for national and public interests: are projects that use land according to planning other than projects under methods 1 and 2.

Plans for land acquisition, compensation, and resettlement with people's participation. When the majority of people (the majority is understood to be over 75% of the people and people with over 75% of the recovered land area) agree, the state will issue a decision to acquire. After the decision to acquire is made, there will be an auction to select land users or a bidding for land use projects to select investors.

Ha Linh

Source: https://www.congluan.vn/du-thao-luat-dat-dai-sua-doi-ai-thu-hoi-dat-mang-lai-loi-ich-xa-hoi-tot-hon-post253307.html