The Ghana Institution of Surveyors (GhIS) has called on Parliament to pass the long-delayed Surveying Council Bill. It said the continued delay in passing the Bill was weakening efforts to regulate the profession and eliminate unqualified practitioners.
Speaking at the 21st Surveyors’ Week and 57th Annual General Meeting (AGM) held in Accra last week, the President of the Institution, Mr Kofi Obeng Ayirebi, described the proposed legislation as crucial to reforming the industry and strengthening public confidence.
“Securing surveying practice through an Act of Parliament is not merely a professional matter. It is a governance issue, an investment protection issue, and fundamentally a national security issue,” he said.
He stressed that land administration, valuation, infrastructure planning, and spatial data management were central to national development and public accountability and must be properly regulated.
Reiterating the profession’s relevance, Mr Obeng Ayirebi said surveying underpinned land administration, valuation, quantity surveying, mining, hydrographic services, and geospatial intelligence—all critical to infrastructure, housing, and urban development.
He maintained that accurate measurement, reliable valuation, and effective cost management were indispensable to sustainable development, stressing that surveying did not merely support development but enables it.
Speaking on land tenure systems, the Managing Director of Petra Trust Company Ltd, Mr Kofi Fynn, said billions of cedis in pension and insurance funds were available for long-term investment, but unlocking that capital depended on credible land systems and high professional standards in the surveying sector.
He stressed that surveyors were central to national development, as capital required secure land titles, precision, collaboration, and strong ethical standards.
The Ministry of Lands and Natural Resources, meanwhile, said it was taking steps to address long-standing challenges in Ghana’s land administration system through the Land Bank and Digitalisation Project.
The initiative, being implemented with the Lands Commission, seeks to modernise land data management by establishing a centralised Land Bank and digitising land records and processes to improve transparency and efficiency.
BY TIMES REPORTER
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