The land use regime in Moldova is characterized by irregularities that impose costs that limit the economic potential and revenues of local budgets, according to a report by the supervisory body.
The main discrepancies concern, first of all, the land plots’ land surveying. These include non-compliance with deadlines, insufficient interaction between authorities, and incomplete cadastral documentation. Thus, as of the beginning of 2025, state-owned land with a total area of 6,007.42 hectares out of 15 inspected administrative-territorial units was not registered in the Real Estate Register, and the registered land was not properly reflected in the accounting records of local authorities.
Many violations are also revealed in land leasing. The inspection found that local authorities did not comply with the regulatory framework when granting state land for lease, use or superficies. In some cases, land was granted without organizing public tenders, and internal controls were insufficient, resulting in a loss of income subject to recovery of about 3.3 million lei.
Shortcomings in contract management were also identified, allowing unauthorized use of land and construction of buildings without documentation. In other cases, the authorities did not take effective measures to recover rent arrears amounting to 3.9 million lei, and the registration and tracking of related arrears were inadequate. At the same time, some contracts with a term of more than 5 years were not registered in the Register of Immovable Property, which affected their legal certainty.
There are also a lot of inconsistencies in the alienation of land plots. There is no accounting of the assigned status of land, and there are no reports on the assessment of market value. As a result, the tax revenues to local budgets decreased by 154.3 thousand lei, the lack of proper control by LPA bodies over compliance with contractual terms of sale and purchase, and the depreciation of land plots.
And when changing the category of designation in some local administrations, there are even “miraculous” transformations of the plots withdrawn from agricultural use – losses are not calculated and not compensated, the territory of plots turns out to be incorrectly divided by the boundaries of settlements, and the definition of land designation on paper does not correspond to that in reality, the audit report of the Court of Accounts says.
