Government begins registering properties and forest along Phase 1

The SNDF, with the land authority ANATI, opened a $718,000 process to map structures, crops, and forest in the Phase 1 band of influence from Panamá City to Divisa. Each structure will be measured, photographed, and GPS-located.

Background & context

This $718,000 registry, run with land authority ANATI, is the fieldwork counterpart to the $338,812 Renfe bridge review and the eleven-firm survey tender that followed two and a half weeks later, together they mark the project's first sustained contact with private land along Panamá City–Divisa. GPS-locating and photographing each structure before any compensation offer is made is the right sequence: it creates a documented baseline that's harder to dispute later.

What isn't yet public is the valuation methodology, whether compensation will track market rates, replacement cost, or a government schedule. That detail, still unannounced, is what will determine whether affected families see this phase as fair or extractive.