
Touch the Soil News #423 (Feature photo courtesy of HELVETAS) Here in the United States, we have title companies that document land ownership and enforceable liens on land. Seventy percent of all bank loans are collateralized by land – real estate. It is these loans that stand behind the dollars that banks invoke and are the backbone of the nation’s economic activities. Documentable ownership of land is also the backbone of access to land. Much of the land in Asia, Africa and South America lack the ownership / lien documentation here in the United States. This also limits the use of credit for economic development in third-world nations – creating…