Foreign land ownership

Foreign land ownership

The article on land leasing and ownership by foreign residents
in Bali (Sunday, Sept. 3, 1995) was interesting because it
mirrored similar issues elsewhere. What is needed is a legal
provision for long leases: leases of 40, 50 or even 99 years.
This then guarantees that the family of original owners retain
the title of ownership.

For many decades in Ireland, foreigners could buy small
amounts of land on a sliding scale without reference to any
government body beyond the legal necessity of registering change
of ownership. A German, for instance, could buy five acres of
excellent land or by degrees -- 30 acres of rock, bog and
heather. For larger pieces of land, a body called the Land
Commission considered the local implications of the sale and
eventually either approved or forbade the purchase (or cobbled
together an acceptable compromise).

The system worked well, if slowly, until Irish membership of
the EU rendered it an anachronism. The percentage of Irish land
owned by foreigners is a tiny, tiny fraction of the nation's
area, even today when there are no legal impediments to foreign
ownership of land.

WILLIAM CORR

Osaka, Japan