The land system in Korea, which is based on the land-to-the-tiller principle, has been institutionally managed using the proof of qualification in land purchase and the land disposal order. However, the proof of qualification in land purchase lost its capability as a management tool, as the requirement for issuing the documents was quite eased in 2002. For complying with the land-to-the-tiller principle the land disposal order, which is a ex-post control, became the only tool for us to be able to use. It is critical to keep a stable land system and we need to investigate whether the land disposal order successfully has been doing its role. If not, how to improve the managing system is a question we need to answer.
The research was conducted using various ways such as literature review, interview, survey, and organizing experts meeting. First, we tried to generally look at land managing status by interviewing some local officials who are in charge of land managing and the government land survey to measure land usage status. Then a nationwide survey of local land managing officials was conducted for all the cities and town.
An investigation on the government land survey to measure land usage status indicated that the lack of manpower is a major problem. It makes the survey be limited in certain areas, making it hard to represent the nation. Accordingly, It can't be viewed as a thorough study hence the role of survey in preventing illegal land owning is happened to be limited.
In order to establish a more effective land managing system, it is necessary to have both ex-ante and ex-post tools and we currently have only a half of it. As a remedy to supplement the ex-ante, we suggest to introduce both a so called managing scheme in transaction and lease, and a preemptive scheme.
We have some suggestions for improving the land disposal order system. First, we need to differentiate the land with actual examination with the land in a regular government land survey. Second, The improvement of the land survey technique is necessary along with the increase of survey staffs and the corresponding budget. Third, in order to solve the problem that is a low of less than 1% notice of the disposition obligation, we need a more thorough land survey especially for the leased land. Fourth, the disposal deferral for the land that received the land disposal order has to be issued in more stringent ways. By doing annual review, we need to prevent unnecessary expunction of disposal obligation. Finally, for the land with overdue payments in execution enforcement fines, we allow the farmland bank to buy them in bulk exercising a preemptive right.


Researchers: Soo-Suk Kim
Research period: 2011. 7. - 2011. 12.
E-mail address: soosuk@krei.re.kr