The purchase of land by the Government advances within the framework of the agrarian reform. According to the National Land Agency (ANT), of the 2,321 sales offers received, 966 properties representing 147,634 hectares have already exceeded the technical and legal pre-feasibility by the entity, that is, they are viable for acquisition.

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He director of the ANT, Gerardo VegaHe explained that what is sought is the purchase of fertile land for food production, for which the budget costs 1.5 trillion pesos.

In total, the goal is to benefit 300,000 families, of which 70 percent are located in the Caribbean region in departments such as Atlántico, Bolívar, Córdoba, La Guajira, Magdalena and Sucre.

“The ANT has given priority to women and people with an agrarian vocation and in a position to make the field produce, for this reason it was sought that the purchased properties are not floodable lands, or illegally occupied, and that they comply with the environmental, agrarian and ecological provisions to deliver quality land. This is one of the Government’s goals in its fight against hunger and contribution to total peace,” said Vega.

According to the agency, the forecasts that have been ruled out so far judicial actions of extinction of domain are registered, inconsistencies in their cadastral registration or they are linked to land restitution processes, for which reason they would not be viable for purchase.

In addition to this, the reform also seeks to formalize the land. To date, the entity has formalized more than 1.4 million hectares of which more than one million correspond to rural properties and 396,000 more hectares in four peasant reserve areas: La Tuna (Cauca), Güejar–Cafre, Losada– Guayabero (Meta) and Sumapaz (Bogotá).