This paper presents several case studies to show how the Ujamaa Community Resource Team (UCRT) has been working within Tanzania’s legal and policy framework to support a diverse range of pastoralists, agro-pastoralists and hunter-gatherers, all of whom face fundamental threats from external appropriation of, or encroachment on, lands and natural resources. The work also responds to local needs to rationalise resource use rights amongst competing local groups, such as farmers and livestock keepers.

The first draft of the Tanzanian constitution incorporates many provisions that will improve the rights and interests of pastoralists, huntergatherers and women in these communities.

 However, there remain some important outstanding issues that must be addressed in order to ensure adequate reform that protects these marginalized groups’ interests

Communal lands are central to the livelihoods of many Tanzanians, particularly to pastoralists and hunter-gatherer groups. But a number of factors can undermine the security of these lands remaining ‘communal,’ in turn threatening the livelihoods of many people and cultures. This brief sets out a new mechanism for strengthening community land rights by securing local tenure through acquiring a Certificate of Customary Right of Occupancy (CCRO).

In northern Tanzania, new grassroots groups called Women’s Rights and Leadership Forums (WRLFs) are mobilizing women and men in pastoralist communities to promote and defend local land rights. This briefing highlights some of the WRLFs’ achievements and strategies; asks how these forums, which appear to be a part of an emerging grassroots social movement for land rights, can be further supported; and explores whether such forums could be replicated elsewhere in the region

Large-scale land acquisitions have increased in scale and pace due to changes in commodity markets, agricultural investment strategies, land prices, and a range of other policy and market forces. The areas most affected are the global “commons” – lands that local people traditionally use collectively — including much of the world’s forests, wetlands, and rangelands. In some cases land acquisition occurs with environmental objectives in sight – including the setting aside of land as protected areas for biodiversity conservation.

Across the world, areas with high or important biodiversity are often located within Indigenous peoples’ and local communities’ conserved territories and areas (ICCAs). Traditional and contemporary systems of stewardship embedded within cultural practices enable the conservation, restoration and connectivity of ecosystems, habitats, and specific species in accordance with indigenous and local worldviews. In spite of the benefits ICCAs have for maintaining the integrity of ecosystems, cultures and human wellbeing, they are under increasing threat.

This report provides an overview of the conflict in Loliondo, reviewing historical information, current land uses and tenure arrangements. 

In this publication two pioneering grassroots organisations from northern Tanzania examine and present their experiences and insights from their long-term work to secure the land rights of hunter-gatherer and pastoral communities. The case studies were presented at a one-day learning event held on 5th October 2012, when Pastoral Women’s Council (PWC) and Ujamaa Community Resource Team (UCRT) joined together to share and reflect on their work to secure land rights, to learn from each other, and to identify ways to build on their achievements moving forward.

Large-scale land acquisitions are increasing in pace and scale, in particular across parts of Africa, Asia and Latin America. Weak governance and poor land use planning mean that commercial ‘land grabs’ often damage biodiversity as well as dispossessing people from customary rights and livelihoods. Land can also be ‘grabbed’ for ‘green’ purposes, triggering conflicts that undermine potential synergies. Expanded state protected areas, land for carbon offset markets and REDD, and for private conservation projects all potentially conflict with community rights.

Pastoralist and hunter-gatherer communities in Tanzania are gaining rights to own and control their land as the foundation for generating new income through REDD+ 

This study documents the plight of the Maasai pastoralists who have moved to Morogoro and Kilosa districts as a result of the recent socio-economic developments and environmental changes in Maasailand. The objective of this study was to analyse how the Maasai migrants have adapted themselves to the new ecological conditions and the impact of such adaptations on their livelihoods.

IWGIA has recently been informed by local partners in Tanzania that a government operation aimed at forcefully removing pastoralists from the Kilosa district in the Morogoro Region in southern Tanzania started on the 29.1.2009. The Tanzanian government wants to remove all pastoralists from Kilosa district and, according to some sources, the whole of Morogoro Region, and force them to other areas of Tanzania. Such areas have though, according to IWGIA local partners as yet not been specified, and the affected families do not know where to go to.