Categorisation of land according to its targeted use is an underlying principle of land legislation in Russia currently, and the regulatory regime for any specific land plot is defined based on the category in which it belongs. But, as practice indicates, this principle has a number of drawbacks.
Given the above, a bill has been drafted to amend Russia’s Land Law and related by-laws, replacing the principle of land-use categorisation with that of functional land zoning. The draft provides for the following changes:
- Removing the notion “land category” from effective legislation, along with the procedure of assigning land and land lots to a particular class, while at the same time preserving the procedure of determining territorial zones in land use and development rules;
- Creating an alternative procedure for determining and changing the borders of land zones; determining their types, composition and characteristics;
- Establishing a procedure for designating permitted uses of land plots, both in line with zone use regulations as well as in cases where these are inapplicable or non-existent with regard to certain types of territories;
- Enhancing safeguards for preserving and protecting land of special agricultural value, including by establishing agricultural regulations with regard to farmlands, and for identifying criteria of designating land lots as having special agricultural value, along with special border reconfiguring regulations for that particular type of land.
For the land categorisation regime to be replaced, functional land zoning documents which determine permitted use of land plots shall be elaborated and enacted throughout the Russian Federation.
The draft law is aimed at consolidating the institution of property, creating conditions for a uniform procedure of designating permitted land uses, creating a territorial planning procedure and facilitating the system of managing land resources and urban development.
