Current trends in land surveying in southern Africa

This paper gives a brief account of the main activities today and future perspectives in land surveying and mapping in Southern Africa. Of particular interest is possible solutions being sought to solve the main problems of mapping and land redistribution, necessitated by the colonial past of these countries. The thrust towards an advanced industrial society, with its emphasis on information technology and the expanding concept of the land information system which has profoundly influenced the acquisition, storage, manipulation and the use of topographic data is also being considered for this region. The legislation of most Southern African countries originates from the Roman Dutch law and their surveys are all based on the Arc of the 30th Meridian, a first-order triangulation from South Africa to North Africa. South Africa, like Zimbabwe, having had similar discriminatory governments, is now in need of resettlement schemes. This paper looks at the mapping and cadastral situation in Southern Africa. Because this region is undergoing constant socio-political and socio-economic change, writing a paper is far from easy with land being one of the issues which is very contentious in this region, the situation is not conducive to make a realistic assessment of the market position. -from Author