Dr. Dennis Mbugua Muthama

I am a Lecturer in Real Estate studies with a specialisation in land administration and management at the Department of Real Estate, Construction Management and Quantity Surveying at the University of Nairobi. I am a Land Economist by training. I received my PhD in Geomatics Engineering from the University of Calgary, Canada.  I also held a Postdoctoral Research Fellowship position at the British Institute in Eastern Africa, Nairobi, Kenya, between 2023 and 2025. I have written extensively on issues related to the complex relationship between land tenure administration and urbanisation, particularly in the peripheries. In my work, I have explored the effectiveness of official land tenure administration systems and the role of street-level land administration officials in peri-urban contexts in Nairobi and Mombasa, Kenya. My ongoing research examines the digitalisation of land administration processes in the rapidly urbanising peripheries of the Nairobi Metropolitan Region (NMR). To this end, my work has appeared in well-regarded peer-reviewed journals, including Urban Forum, Survey Review, International Journal of Urban and Regional Research, Urban Geography, Digital Geographies and Society, Geographical Journal, and Geomatica. I regularly contribute to public debates on land tenure administration and digitisation through blogs and think pieces in industry magazines such as GIM. I have also worked with various types of stakeholders, including researchers, policymakers (from state agencies), and multilateral organisations (such as UNIDO and RCMRD) on different land administration assignments. Professionally, I am a Full Member of the Institution of Surveyors of Kenya (MISK) and a Fellow of the Chartered Institute of Arbitrators (FCIArb). My general research interest areas include land tenure, land administration and digitalisation, land tenure administration in urban peripheries, and land tenure administration in post-conflict urban contexts. I am particularly interested in exploring the challenges of digital transformation in land administration and its impact on land relations within different contexts in Kenya.