A vision for spatially informed land administration in Australia

Abstract

Research to incorporate sustainable development objectives into an information communication technology (ICT)enabled land administration system (LAS) began with the task of defining an emerging vision for spatial information. Incommon with European countries which enjoy mature LAS (Switzerland, Denmark, The Netherlands and Germany),Australian LAS could benefit from the spatial enablement of land information, following the model of the spatiallyenabled geocoded national address file (GNAF). Specific instances include opportunities for more comprehensiveinformation about restrictions over land, remodelling the Torrens system into a modern land information system, andcreating national land information systems.Transition from the existing infrastructure of LAS to the new model requires –• selective borrowing from experiences particularly in the European Union and USA• new models of information sharing• capacity to anticipate developments in technology in location enablement and spatial identification• building on Australia’s capacity to create opportunities for government and the private sector in using spatialinformation in the ICT environment.