National Decentralisation Policy.

This National Decentralisation Policy(NDP) is a cross-sectoral policy document. The purpose of the NDP is to reduce poverty, promote equitable local development and enhance participatory governance, by transferring functions, responsibilities and resources for service delivery to local authorities and empowering citizens to actively participate in all service delivery processes.
The NDP considers decentralisation to be a good mechanism to facilitate job creation, food security and poverty reduction, which often require local solutions.
One of the strategic objectives is: To increase livelihood and economic security by ensuring sustainable utilisation and management of land and other natural resources, and controlling environmental degradation. The Government appreciates the fact that unplanned use of the scarce land resources is a major constraint to Lesotho’s efforts to ensure food security, promote commercial agriculture, eradicate rural poverty and ensure sustainable development. The Government shall promote rational and integrated land use planning to ensure optimal productivity and sustainable use of land resources. Strategic actions include: i) Developing an integrated land use and management master plan to guide all rural and urban land uses; ii) Undertake land evaluation to establish land use potentials and suitability for different land units in all districts and municipalities; iii) Review land registration and allocation systems to incorporate incentives for productive and sustainable use of land and other resources therein; iv) Develop guidelines and tools for planned land use, sensitisation of farmers, and land use monitoring, among others.
According to the NDP, decentralisation must be used as an instrument for rural development and equitable growth. One of the strategic objectives is: To promote equitable economic development by encouraging and facilitating local economic activities, through local infrastructure development, incentive-based investor mobilisation and other initiatives that directly benefit local people. Policy priorities and strategic actions include: (i) Establish village development committees, as community structures to interface with local technocrats in articulating and translating local people’s needs into action plans; (ii) Ensure that qualified Rural/Community Development facilitators are deployed at lower administrative levels to work as Village Development Facilitators. Ensure that they are appropriately equipped to work harmoniously with local people, and political leaders; (iii) Establish local development support funds to assure reliable financing for local development projects; iv) Promoting public-private partnerships (PPP) to attract private capital investments especially in rural areas and strategic sectors and establish mechanisms to support simple PPPs that benefit local poor people (with special attention to youth, women); etc.
Strategic actions for enabling more inclusive and efficient agricultural systems include: i) Invest in local development infrastructure (including ICTs, roads, markets,) to expand local livelihoods and economic development opportunities; ii) Develop the capacity and innovativeness of local leaders to attract investors and mobilise citizens for production; etc.
Strategic actions for increasing the resilience of livelihoods to disasters include: Formulate a strategy for settlement re-organisation to promote organised settlements in line with the long-term goals of access to basic services and adaptation to climate change and other related disasters.
In addition, one of guiding principles for the NDP is: inclusive governance. Decentralisation must ensure gender equality and equity, and effective participation of youth, people with disabilities (PWDs) and other excluded groups. This principle is consistent with the Constitution 1993, national laws on gender equality and equity and international conventions6 to which Lesotho is signatory.