Land and Cooperative Development Deputy Minister Dr Tan Kee Kwong said last week the pilot phase would be implemented "soon," before the E-Tanah project is rolled out to other states.
The project is a component of the Multimedia Super Corridor's E-Government Flagship Application. "All land offices will be eventually linked in a network," he said in a speech Thursday at the official launch of the Geoinformation For Executives (G4E) application developed by the Malaysia Centre for Geospatial Data Infrastructure (MacGDI).
Tan said the Government hoped to have E-Tanah up and running in all states by 2006.
Ministry Secretary General Datuk Yidris Abdullah told reporters later that the Government had allocated RM50mil for the pilot phase, which would be implemented with the help of consultants to be appointed by April.
The cost of the pilot phase will be funded by development allocations under the Eighth Malaysia Plan, while the rollout of E-Tanah to other states will be funded under the upcoming Ninth Malaysia Plan, he added.
Yidris declined to provide an estimate of the total cost of the nationwide rollout, adding "even if I knew, I wouldn't tell you."
"Once the figure becomes public knowledge, there would be no end of vendors and contractors knocking on my door," he added, half in jest.
Yidris said the pilot phase would last for two years, after which the Government would evaluate the effectiveness of the E-Tanah application before introducing it to other states.
"We have to make sure it is workable," he added.
Yidris also said Penang was chosen for the pilot phase because its size was manageable, and that parts of the state's land administration system had been computerised and were already compliant with the requirements of E-Tanah.
"The project would cut processing time of things like applications for ownership transfers, as all the components would be online with each other," he added.
Yidris also said that as all processes would be computerised under the E-Tanah project, land offices would be made more efficient and there would be "less corruption."
"No more delays, no more files lost, no more files that can't be found, no more hanky-panky," he added.
Data, data everywhere
Earlier, Tan said the ministry hoped to make available geospatial data services in all states soon.
The services, provided by MacGDI, was currently available for Kuala Lumpur, Labuan, Perlis, Kedah, Malacca and Sabah, where infrastructure for the sharing of geospatial data had been put in place.
"I hope state governments and agencies continue to support the efforts of the Ministry and MacGDI by providing the latest land data," he said.
The G4E application is MacGDI's newest service, targeted at executive officers in the public and private sectors involved in land-related policy development, development planning, monitoring and enforcement.
The application's components include data sets on land management, land use, public facilities, population, environment and transportation systems.
The data currently available is on Kuala Lumpur only, but MacGDI officials said they hope to expand it soon.
Autor: Raslan Sharif
Quelle: The Star online, 20.02.2004
