Ethiopia’s capital, Addis Ababa is going to have a new land lease pricing benchmark by the coming Ethiopian year. The new pricing benchmark is going to put in to consideration cost benefit analysis.
Addis Ababa University Institute of Architecture, Building Construction and City Development (EiABC) after concluding a sub-contract of the project, completed the study to determine the benchmarking and tabled the report for discussion to researchers and city administration officials.
According to Alemayehu Mulate, Lease Implementation and Inspection head at the Addis Ababa City Land Banking and Transfer Agency, the new study will be concluded on September.
Currently there are three categories Addis Ababa zoning is classified into. However, the new approach will bring more new zones because it takes into consideration the cost of infrastructure in each area of the city.
Sisay Zenebe, project coordinator at EiABC’s urban policy department, noted the Institute in its study took a different approach when it comes to setting up benchmarks.
He said: “We are working to set benchmark prices on infrastructure so we want those factors to determine the prices. However, the city wants to consider the price they are selling plots for currently”. “After all, we are working to identify the factors at an area level but the Administration set prices at a plot level,” he added.
The current classification is based on distance of the plot form the center. It divides the city into three zones; a city center, transition zone and expansion zones.
On the other hand the new study gives more values to factors such as radial - along the road infrastructure - land use and other infrastructures.
Sisay noted the reason for deviating from the current practice is the difficulty to identify the center of the capital city. This forced the experts to recognize different areas as having similar economic value.
The new approach dictates areas such as Bethel, Bole and Biherawi to be considered as deserving higher prices. Nonetheless, Sisya claims he does not expect a significant price change.
Currently the Addis Ababa city’s land lease starting price ranges from 191 Birr to 1,686 Birr per square meter.
Source: Capital
