Context
The forest fires that occurred in Portugal in 2017, which claimed many lives and caused extensive damage, marked a turning point on how urgent it is to solve existing property management problems. The terrible event highlighted how important accurate land identification, effective property management and open land ownership are. The project BUPi was then developed, based on a successful pilot in 10 municipalities, as a physical service counter and an online service, both using the same digital platform. Here, landowners were able to geo-reference their property and start or amend their land registration, allowing BUPi (Balcão Único do Prédio) to collect data on properties and their owners.
The project acknowledges the importance of improved state governance and policy-making in negotiating the complexity of property management, particularly in rural areas. With the help of this transformational project, Portugal will have a land registry that is essential for any public or private decision-making process regarding the territory, promoting sustainable growth. In response to the pressing concerns and within the framework of administrative modernisation and digital transformation, BUPi started to address these challenges and to enhance property management.
Objectives
The BUPi project’s primary objectives include the following: (1) Territorial planning: BUPi intends to significantly contribute to planning and enhancing people’s overall quality of life by aggregating, crossing and making available information about properties that was previously scattered in multiple institutions. (2) Simplification: simplifying the processes for registering and recognising properties. This improves market efficiency while lowering costs associated with administration and bureaucracy for real estate transactions, making it easier to acquire, sell and manage real estate. (3) Improved transparency: by offering accurate and up-to-date information on properties, BUPi has the potential to enhance transparency in property management, which benefits property owners, government agencies and the public. (4) Fighting forest fires and irregularities: BUPi helps to tackle Portugal’s ongoing problem with forest fires and property irregularities pre-fire, during-fire and post-fire. (5) Making investments easier: Portugal may become more appealing to both domestic and foreign investors by streamlining identification, being transparent and by providing investors with more information. (6) Enhancing administrative efficiency: BUPi improves the property management procedure within the public sector by minimising duplication of effort and facilitating collaboration. (7) Promoting access to information: BUPi streamlines access to property data – including registry information – for locals, companies and academic institutions.
Implementation
The BUPi digital transformation project is making significant progress with a secured budget of €45 million from the EU Recovery and Resilience Facility that covers the project from 2022 until the end of 2025. A Unit Mission team is coordinating and overseeing, at the national level, the project’s implementation. The team consists of 12 individuals with specific roles covering various functional areas. Furthermore, external collaborations are being leveraged to ensure the successful implementation of BUPi. These partnerships include consultants, technology vendors and industry experts, but also academical and scientific institutions, as well as other public and private institutions. There is a strong consensus among policy-makers to support BUPi.
This digital approach is more resilient to natural disasters and human actions, and distinguishes itself from the traditional approach based on sending government teams and equipment to the territory to undertake land and property registration operations that were very time-consuming, costly and had limited effectiveness. The digital transformation project promotes dematerialisation and data interoperability, ensuring the efficient exchange of information among relevant entities.