WASHINGTON, D.C. – The Annual World Bank Conference on Land and Poverty, held in Washington, D.C., brings together representatives from governments, civil society, academia, the private sector, and the development community to discuss issues concerning land tenure security and land use policies.

Thomson Reuters is proud to be a supporting partner and the Platinum Sponsor of the conference.

Nigel Edmead, director of training for the Tax & Accounting business of Thomson Reuters, co-authored a paper for the conference on an integrated tax parcel mapping and registry project conducted for Cross Rivers State, Nigeria. He also will lead two training workshops on Thomson Reuters OpenTitle software, a system in use in Liberia, Bolivia, and Angola to map, record, and document land and resource rights.

Christopher Barlow, director of strategic relations and communications at Thomson Reuters and a contributing member to the conference’s Program Committee, will present a paper on new ways government and technology firms are partnering to create more efficient land and property information management systems.

Also representing Thomson Reuters at this year’s conference are Sharon Sayles Belton, vice president of community affairs, and Alex Piliptchak, senior director for product strategy. Sayles Belton will moderate a session on government programs to improve urban land use and generate revenue to support land administration. Piliptchak will moderate a session on how governments benefit from investing in spatially enabled land and property information systems.

The Land and Poverty Conference started as a gathering of 10 people in 1999. This year, more than 900 delegates representing 90 countries will attend. “This growth in attendance and broad geographic representation speak volumes to the growing awareness of how land rights impact so many facets of social and economic growth,” said Bill McKinzie, executive vice president at Thomson Reuters.

Klaus Deininger, lead economist in the World Bank's Research Department and author of the 2011 book Rising Global Interest in Farmland, said, "The Bank Group has a vital role to play on the land issue, in convening diverse stakeholders, in implementing projects and programs, in researching what works and what doesn't, and in building capacity for an informed and evidence-based policy dialogue."

The theme of this year’s conference is ‘Moving Towards Transparent Land Governance: Evidence-Based Next Steps’. H.E. Festus Mogae, former president of the Republic of Botswana, will deliver the keynote address. Live streaming feeds from the conference opening and closing sessions will be broadcast on the conference website. The World Bank also will post daily blogs to this website.

During the conference Thomson Reuters and other supporting partners will provide Twitter updates to #landrights. Thomson Reuters will post daily blogs from the conference to tax.thomsonreuters.com/category/blog/government-revenue-management/.

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