Falling Off the Map: The Impact of Formalizing (Some) Informal Settlements in Tanzania

Matthew Collin, Justin Sandefur and Andrew Zeitlin

No 2015-09, CSAE Working Paper Series from Centre for the Study of African Economies, University of Oxford

Abstract: When the Tanzanian government formalized over 200,000 informal land claims by granting leasehold titles to residents of unplanned settlements in Dar es Salaam in 2004, a few neighborhoods in the initial plan were excluded due to missing satellite photos. We examine the impact of this low-cost, large-scale titling intervention a decade later in a regression discontinuity design using new survey data collected on either side of the arbitrary boundary created by the missing photos. We find significant, positive effects on housing investment, and indicative but not statistically robust increases in tenure security and reductions in land sales. There is no evidence that titles improved access to credit markets.

Keywords: land titling; formalization; natural experiment; Tanzania (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: J16 K11 O12 O18 Q15 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2015
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-afr, nep-agr, nep-dev, nep-iue and nep-ure
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (13)

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