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The Land Registry would continue to improve the quality of services to customers and make steady progress towards the introduction of title registration, the Land Registrar, Mr Kim Salkeld, said today (October 22).
Commenting on the publication of the report of the Land Registry Trading Fund for 2007/08, Mr Salkeld said: "While our minds and efforts will remain firmly focused on clearing the final hurdles to title registration, we will continue to take whatever opportunities we find along the way to improve the quality of existing services, whether by ourselves or in collaboration with other parties."
For the financial year ended March 31, 2008, the Land Registry Trading Fund achieved a net profit after tax of $176 million, a return of 36% on average net fixed assets. The Trading Fund will pay a dividend of $288 million to the Capital Investment Fund.
The figures were released in the 15th Annual Report of the Land Registry Trading Fund tabled in the Legislative Council today by the Secretary for Development, Mrs Carrie Lam.
Mr Salkeld said that the Integrated Registration Information System (IRIS) provided public access to land registry information over the Internet as well as special services for business users, management of the 2.8 million registers and 18 million documents kept by the Land Registry and support for the Land Registry's business process.
To address the demand for uninterrupted services as quickly as possible, the Land Registry decided to fast-track a project to develop a new public search system. This will operate independently from the current IRIS system and the future title registration system. Information services for the public will then not be affected by any work that has to be done to develop or enhance the internal registration systems.
"We have seen a 52% increase in the number of business subscribers since the launch of IRIS and 89% of the 5.4 million searches made during the year used our electronic services," Mr Salkeld said.
The 15th Annual Report of the Land Registry Trading Fund can be viewed or downloaded through the Land Registry website at www.landreg.gov.hk
Ends/Wednesday, October 22, 2008
Issued at HKT 12:30
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