Towards sustainable land management in Serbia: The story of Čačak's WebGIS rollout

Abstract

The article outlines the progress in a bilateral co-operation project between Serbia and Germany to address the issue of standardization in order to prepare the country for the future. The project called 'Strengthening of local land management in Serbia' started in January 2010 and is being conducted by AMBERO Consulting and ICON Institute on behalf of the GIZ (Deutsche Gesellschaft für Internationale Zusammenarbeit (GIZ) GmbH) and financed by the German Federal Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development (BMZ)The Government of the Republic of Serbia has already taken significant steps in the modernization and adaption of the legal framework, including in the areas of land management and urban development. In September 2009, the new Planning and Building Act was passed, which among other things aimed to improve investment conditions in Serbia. When the new planning and construction law was passed in 2009, the Serbian government obliged local governments to establish local information systems for planning documents and spatial conditions in order to track and monitor spatial changes.