Geoportal for online monitoring of the use and inventory of agricultural land in pilot launched

Kazakhstan • 06 March, 2020

Geoportal for online monitoring of the use and inventory of agricultural land in pilot launched

In the second half of 2019, the ministry jointly with JSC QazGaryzhSapary created a geoportal in pilot mode for online monitoring of the use and inventory of agricultural land using satellite imagery in the Akmola and North Kazakhstan regions, primeminister.kz reports.

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According to the results of these works, in 2019 in the Akmola region 289.2 thousand hectares of unused, 133.6 thousand hectares of unrecorded and self-captured lands were identified. In North Kazakhstan — 284.3 thousand hectares of unused, 88.7 thousand hectares of unaccounted for and self-seized lands.

On unaccounted sites, akimats are working on their execution with a notification, and on unauthorized seized and unused sites, materials are being prepared for submission to the court for their seizure. This year, the audit work will continue in other regions.

In November 2019, the ministry completed a detailed analysis of the availability of pastures that are assigned to agricultural enterprises and the population of villages. The norms of the load on pastures and the actual availability of agricultural animals in the context of districts, rural districts and farms were compared.

The analysis showed that in almost all areas, especially in the southern regions, there is a shortage of pasture land for the local population. At the same time, 72.4 million ha of pastures are assigned to existing farms, of which almost half are not loaded with a sufficient number of livestock.

In addition, in 2019, the Land Management Committee, in the framework of state control over compliance with land legislation, returned to the state property through the court — 1.2 million hectares of unused land, of which 37 thousand hectares are arable land, 1,163 thousand hectares are pastures.

On these lands, work is underway on their redistribution to new land users and their involvement in agricultural circulation.

The Ministry also produced soil and geobotanical electronic maps of open access to obtain data on the soil bonitet score and feed capacity of pasture lands. An Action Plan has been approved, providing for the establishment by the end of 2021 of borders (lines) of 2,480 rural settlements, which will determine the actual size of pasture land necessary for the needs of the local population. Today, borders have been set in 1,611 settlements; it is required to establish borders in 869.

In addition, in the spring of 2019, unused 1.7 million hectares of agricultural land of the problematic latifundist agricultural holding were transferred to 43 new investors, that is, this area was segmented to optimal sizes and allowed to reduce the entrepreneurial risks of inefficient management.

The new owners have invested about 20 billion tenge of investments only in the spring field work, paid debts on taxes and wages, and saved jobs. It should be noted that in all the above cases, investors are domestic legal entities and citizens of Kazakhstan.

The ministry has developed amendments to the Land, Entrepreneurial and Tax Codes regarding the reduction of the stages of inspections and the timing of the withdrawal of unused agricultural land (from 2 years to 1 year), as well as a 20-fold increase in the tax on unused agricultural land.

Today, the concept of the draft Law has been developed, which is posted on the Internet portal of open non-governmental organizations and the Ministry of Agricultyre Internet resource for public discussion, and is also sent to private businesses for an expert opinion.

Regarding the instructions of the Head of State to conduct a pilot project on space monitoring of land use, on Oct. 28, 2019, amendments were made to the Land Code of the Republic of Kazakhstan on land monitoring, including through remote sensing data.

In implementation of these norms, in January of this year, the Rules on Cosmos Monitoring of the Use of Agricultural Land were adopted.

In 4 regions (Akmola, Kostanay, East Kazakhstan and Mangystau), organizational work is underway to launch a pilot project to monitor agricultural land through a web portal.

To date, tenders for the procurement of web portal services have been announced in all areas of these regions.

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