Antigua and Barbuda Prime Minister Gaston Browne has announced that the government will implement rigorous eligibility regulations for its ambitious $1 land initiative on the island of Barbuda, restricting access largely to individuals who maintained residency on the island around the arrival of Hurricane Irma in 2017. In an address delivered to local radio station Pointe FM this past Saturday, Browne outlined that the strict parameters are a proactive measure designed to block opportunistic exploitation of the program by non-residents seeking to secure discounted land parcels without historical ties to the community.
“We have to put the parameters in place in terms of who may be eligible,” Browne emphasized during the interview. The priority of this special land scheme, he explained, is to serve communities that weathered Hurricane Irma and remained on the island in the years following the catastrophic storm that leveled large swathes of Barbuda in September 2017. Eligible participants will be drawn from the population that has continuously resided in Barbuda from the date of the hurricane through the present day, Browne clarified.
Under the terms of the proposed initiative, qualifying residents can acquire plots of land up to one acre in size for a token $1 fee. The program is integrated into a larger government project to overhaul land governance in Barbuda, which includes rolling out formalized land registration and dividing communal land into individual titled parcels across targeted zones like Louis Hill.
Browne made clear that the benefit will not be automatically extended to people of Barbudan descent who live outside the country, nor to outsiders who attempt to leverage distant family connections to qualify for the discounted land. “We’re not catering for people who weren’t even born in Barbuda for that matter, but may have been born to Barbudan parentage thinking that they can get a land for one dollar,” Browne stated, adding, “This is for those who are resident in Barbuda.”
The Prime Minister did note that the eligibility window remains open to naturalized Antiguans and Barbudans, provided they meet the outlined residency requirements. He further explained that the overarching goal of the initiative is to economically and legally empower local residents by granting them formal legal title to their land, while preserving existing occupancy arrangements for any community members who oppose the transition to freehold ownership.