Project EduLAND2: First students graduated in "Land Administration and Surveying" at Debre Markos University


In March 2016, the APPEAR project EduLAND2 (coordinated by the Institute of Geomatics) was launched with the objective to enhance the capacity of Land Administration experts in Ethiopia. One of the project aims was the development of a Bachelor degree program on "Land Administration and Surveying". On 23 January 2021, the first students graduated at Debre Markos University.

In March 2016, the Institute of Land Administration has been established at Debre Markos University with the consortium effort of four universities (Debre Markos University / DMU, University of Natural Resources and Life Sciences Vienna / BOKU, Technical University of Vienna / TUW, Bahir Dar University / BDU) and with the financial support of APPEAR (Austrian Partnership Program in Higher Education and Research for Development). The implementation of the Institute was part of the project EduLAND2 (“Implementation of Academic Land Administration Education in Ethiopia for Supporting Sustainable Development”). The four-year project EduLAND2 (2016-2020) was funded by APPEAR and had the objective to strengthen the launched land administration system in Ethiopia.  

In October 2016, the institute has launched bachelor program by admitting 50 regular students for the first run. Since that time, around 200 students got the possibility to attend courses on land administration and surveying in the regular, summer and extension programs.

On 23 January 2021, 30 regular students graduated in “Land administration and Surveying”. They are the first bachelor graduates in this study program at the university. Due to extended period of completion for continuing education programs, the life-long-learning programs could not finish their study program until yet and even some regular students also did not complete their study in time. Normally, in Ethiopian universities, the date of graduation is celebrated colorfully but in this year due to the pandemic, the number of participants was limited by. Nevertheless, the 30 students (20 of them female students) celebrated together with 4094 other students of 45 different academic programs, whereas the majority of them (3924 students, out of them 1542 females) were undergraduate ones.

In March 2016, the Institute of Land Administration has been established at Debre Markos University with the consortium effort of four universities (Debre Markos University / DMU, University of Natural Resources and Life Sciences Vienna / BOKU, Technical University of Vienna / TUW, Bahir Dar University / BDU) and with the financial support of APPEAR (Austrian Partnership Program in Higher Education and Research for Development). The implementation of the Institute was part of the project EduLAND2 (“Implementation of Academic Land Administration Education in Ethiopia for Supporting Sustainable Development”). The four-year project EduLAND2 (2016-2020) was funded by APPEAR and had the objective to strengthen the launched land administration system in Ethiopia.  

In October 2016, the institute has launched bachelor program by admitting 50 regular students for the first run. Since that time, around 200 students got the possibility to attend courses on land administration and surveying in the regular, summer and extension programs.

On 23 January 2021, 30 regular students graduated in “Land administration and Surveying”. They are the first bachelor graduates in this study program at the university. Due to extended period of completion for continuing education programs, the life-long-learning programs could not finish their study program until yet and even some regular students also did not complete their study in time. Normally, in Ethiopian universities, the date of graduation is celebrated colorfully but in this year due to the pandemic, the number of participants was limited by. Nevertheless, the 30 students (20 of them female students) celebrated together with 4094 other students of 45 different academic programs, whereas the majority of them (3924 students, out of them 1542 females) were undergraduate ones.

All project partners are proud that EduLAND2 could achieve all the objectives documented in the project proposals. In addition, they are happy with the 30 students, who successfully finished their bachelor study program on “Land Administration and Surveying”. May many other follow!

Sayeh Kassaw AGEGNEHU & Reinfried MANSBERGER

February 2021


16.02.2021