Mapping Better Growth for Armenia

Home to 3 million people, Armenia enjoys an upper-middle-income status despite its relatively small size. Armenia is urbanizing fast, with more than 63% of the population living in cities and over half of the urban population concentrated in Yerevan, the capital.

Armenia has moved from a centrally planned economy to a market economy, with new economic, social, and territorial priorities. However, the country lacks critical tools to manage its economic and territorial development. One of these tools is a unified and effective land management system.

“Armenia lacks a unified and effective system to collect and maintain data on land, including basic information such as dimensions, location, value, and ownership,” explains Maria Pia Ancora, project officer with ADB’s Central and West Asia Regional Department. “This results in mismatched data leading to erroneous and non-transparent information about designation, usage, and land ownership, all of which is a drag on investment and economic growth.”

This mandate is particularly important for planning any strategic investment in territorial development and urban infrastructure provision, which needs to rely on updated and integrated digital maps.

Improving land management in Armenia will foster diversified growth and widen inclusiveness through three pillars: priority infrastructure investments, targeted service delivery improvements, and greater regional cooperation and integration.

– Maria Pia Ancora, ADB senior urban development specialist and project officer

Challenges in Data Upkeep

As of January 2021, Armenia’s land parcels and other thematic maps lack standards and harmonization. As a result, data is often duplicated across agencies, which complicates the process of providing information to stakeholders and the public.

Apart from that, the unharmonized data stored in various databases challenges interagency collaboration, increases transaction costs, and delays the implementation of investment programs. The outdated cadastral (land registry) maps also hamper the effective evaluation and monitoring of disasters and land degradation induced by natural hazards (Armenia is prone to seismic activity) and climate change. Finally, these problems stunt efforts to recover from or adapt to them through vulnerability mapping. Armenia needs to establish an effective land management system.

ADB and Partners’ Support

To help Armenia establish an effective land management system, ADB has approved the project Supporting the Establishment of National Standardized Spatial Data Infrastructure, with cofinancing from the High-Level Technology Fund and the Republic of Korea e-Asia and Knowledge Partnership Fund.

“The project is consistent with ADB’s country partnership strategy for Armenia, 2019–2023,” shared Ancora. “Improving land management in Armenia will foster diversified growth and widen inclusiveness through three pillars: priority infrastructure investments, targeted service delivery improvements, and greater regional cooperation and integration.”

The project aims to develop national geographically linked geospatial data standards, set up a geoportal for spatial data management, and standardize custom cartographic layers for migration into the geoportal. Specifically, the project will review the best international practices, including those that have successfully integrated gender information into their geographic information system (GIS). These best practices will inform at least 10 geospatial data standards to direct and regulate spatial data collection and sharing.

The project will also develop a national GIS platform that can host, integrate, and manage databases with layers such as addresses, cadastral parcels, geographical grid systems, geographical names, coordinate reference systems, elevation, and transport networks.

Projected Results

When the project is fully operationalized, Armenia will have effective, state-of-the-art national geospatial data standards and an integrated and multifunctional national portal. These will empower effective land management, support effective tax systems, enable economic activities, and increase Armenia’s e-government capacity.