With availability of robust technologies in managing assets, one would imagine that developing economies would put it in use to solve their problem. However, that has not been the case seeing as governments across Africa are dragging their feet in embracing and adopting technology. One area that is riddled with bottlenecks is the land registry and how land and title deeds are issued and managed. In Kenya for instance, land issues dominate court cases because of scanty records that lack transparency. Land is a very important raw material in the development of a country. Inefficiency in its allocation and management would therefore stall the country’s development agenda as investors especially in manufacturing who require huge chunks of land are turned away. Change of land ownership within the traditional mechanism has led to the emergence of many land disputes that overwhelm the courts, which could be serving other sectors. The good point is, with the rest of the world advancing further, third world economies are forced to adapt. Being in the beginning stages of adaptation, blockchain could streamline the Kenyan land registry as the Department of Lands is looking into utilizing technology to make land searches and other related activities easier.
With this spirit in mind, Land Layby is offering blockchain solutions in different countries across the globe including US, UK, Kenya, Ghana and Australia. In Kenya the project is in the market under the name Harambee Token. The token seeks to make transactions in buying and selling of land seamless by utilizing a decentralized distributed ledger which is shared and immutable. The ledger can not be corrupted, altered or forged therefore solving a lot of the problems that face the land registry in Kenya. The service could also offer an online platform where land searches can be done in mere seconds unlike the current system where it takes months to even get a simple search. This system could eradicate the corruption that is rampant in the sector as well as rogue brokers that are out to swindle potential land buyers.
In addition, apart from decentralizing the land records, the project could also offer the masses an opportunity to trade in land using cryptocurrencies. This could change the way people buy real estate and land as well as combine all land information into a single immutable ledger that can enable investors globally find it easy in establishing their operations in Kenya through a democratized process in the acquisition of land.
Currently, the Harambee Token(HRBE) is trading from as low as 0.7 USD. The project entered presale in September 2018 and ended the phase in March 2019. The project management has has however, not announced when they will go public. According to the official website for the project, the scheme has around 500 million(Kenyan Shillings) in tokens. The scheme does not intend to generate any mare tokens and each token retails form 0.1 ETH(Ethereum) with a maximum token purchase of 50 million HRBE. The scheme is powered by smart contracts and eligible for all people except residents of US, Australia, China, Hong Kong, South Korea and Singapore.
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