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Portrait of Ellen Hillbom. Photo.

Ellen Hillbom

Professor, Deputy head of department, Director of third cycle studies, Department of Economic History

Portrait of Ellen Hillbom. Photo.

Registration of private interests in land in a community lands policy setting : An exploratory study in Meru district, Tanzania

Author

  • Robin Biddulph
  • Ellen Hillbom

Summary, in English

Current Tanzanian land law offers registration of private interests in land in the form of Certificates of Customary Rights of Occupancy (CCROs) within a broader community lands approach. We conducted qualitative research on the issuance of CCROs along a mountain slope transect in Meru district in northeast Tanzania. This area features intensified smallholder agriculture that evolutionary theory suggests is well adapted for registration of private interests in land. It also features strong customary authorities of the sort that legal pluralism theory suggests may lead to property relations that are not singular and evolving but multiple and co-existing. We found that tenure was highly individualized and local demand for CCROs was expressed in a context of both agricultural intensification and nascent urbanisation. Nevertheless, due to high cost and coordination constraints, this demand did not deliver widespread registration. While CCROs were perceived as useful to resolve land conflicts and put up as collateral for loans, they were not essential as a variety of alternative approaches were in place. In this forum shopping, plurality was not in itself a problem and individuals increasingly chose quasi-formal paper authorisations over customary rituals. Based on our findings, we recommend that land administration systems more explicitly build on existing quasi-formal practice, and that community lands approaches include a diversity of national programmes tailored to different local community circumstances.

Department/s

  • Department of Economic History

Publishing year

2020

Language

English

Publication/Series

Land Use Policy

Volume

99

Document type

Journal article

Publisher

Elsevier

Topic

  • Economic Geography

Keywords

  • Community lands
  • Customary title
  • Evolutionary theory
  • Islands of intensification
  • Land registration
  • Legal pluralism
  • Tanzania

Status

Published

ISBN/ISSN/Other

  • ISSN: 0264-8377