Tanzania

Published / Updated: October 29, 2026

Tanzania’s land governance is shaped by public trusteeship, legal recognition of customary rights, village-level administration and extensive state authority over land use and investment. On the mainland, most people access land through overlapping family, customary, village and statutory arrangements; the Land Act and Village Land Act distinguish general, village and reserved land. These categories are administrative and legal classifications, not measures of who actually uses the land. Zanzibar has its own land legislation and institutions, and mainland rules should not automatically be applied to the islands. [Land Act, Cap. 113; Village Land Act, Cap. 114; Zanzibar land laws]

Current priorities include securing village and communal land without erasing seasonal use, making land administration accessible and accountable, protecting women’s inheritance and control, ensuring fair acquisition and compensation, managing urban growth, and resolving disputes around conservation, pastoral mobility, mining and investment. The 2023 edition of the National Land Policy, launched in 2025, and new investment legislation change the policy and institutional context, but policy commitments require practical implementation. [Ministry of Lands, National Land Policy; Investment and Special Economic Zones Act, 2025]

Land institutions reflect colonial administration, independence, socialist villagization, subsequent liberalization and the continuing role of the state. Before independence in 1961, colonial law treated much land as public land while local communities continued to use and administer it through diverse customary systems. After independence, ujamaa and villagization sought to reorganize rural settlement and production, moving authority toward elected village institutions. These policies altered settlement and access in ways that varied by location and remain relevant to claims over boundaries and land allocated during villagization. [Tanzania land tenure profile, 2016; Village Land Act]

Land reform debates in the 1990s sought to reconcile public trusteeship with recognition of existing rights and local participation. The 1995 policy and the 1999 mainland land laws formalized that balance, while retaining strong central powers to acquire and reclassify land. Policy has since had to address urban expansion, environmental pressures and commercial investment. Distributional outcomes depend on who defines land as available, which interests are recorded, and who can influence decisions or challenge them. [Land Act; Village Land Act; National Land Policy, 2023 edition]

Following the 1964 union of Tanganyika and Zanzibar, land remained subject to distinct mainland and Zanzibar regimes. The islands’ history includes the 1964 revolution and the vesting of land in government; land allocation, registration and inheritance must be assessed under Zanzibar’s own laws rather than assumed to follow mainland village-land procedures. [Zanzibar land laws; Tanzania land tenure profile, 2016]

On mainland Tanzania the Land Act, Cap. 113, and Village Land Act, Cap. 114, provide the core framework. Land is public land vested in the President as trustee for citizens; the Acts recognize granted and customary rights of occupancy and distinguish general, village and reserved land. Customary rights can be legally recognized even where documentary evidence is absent. The specific facts, legal status and competing claims must be assessed before assuming that land is unoccupied or available. [Land Act, revised text; Village Land Act, revised text]

The National Land Policy of 1995, 2023 edition, was launched on March 17, 2025. The ministry describes continued public trusteeship and recognition of granted and customary tenure, with a stated commitment to equitable access and women’s rights. A policy states intended direction; it does not itself amend every inconsistent law or guarantee implementation. Landesa identifies both advances in the treatment of women’s inheritance and continuing gaps in inheritance law. [Ministry of Lands, March 2025; Landesa, 2025]

The Land Acquisition Act, Cap. 118, addresses compulsory acquisition for public purposes. Under section 4 of the Village Land Act, the President may direct a transfer of village land for public interest, which includes investments of national interest. Notice, participation and compensation provisions apply, with different procedures depending on the circumstances and extent of the proposed transfer. Section 4 provides for gazetted notice and representations, and differentiates approval procedures according to the area involved. The Act also addresses agreement on the type, amount and timing of compensation and a High Court interim process where compensation is not agreed. The exact procedures and current amendments should be checked against the facts of each proposed transfer. [Village Land Act, section 4] A village consultation should not be treated as proof that every affected right holder consented or received adequate compensation. [Land Acquisition Act; Village Land Act, section 4]

The Investment and Special Economic Zones Act, 2025 replaced the Tanzania Investment Act, 2022 and earlier export-processing and special-economic-zone statutes, establishing the Tanzania Investment and Special Economic Zones Authority (TISEZA). Sectoral laws for mining, environmental management, forests and water also affect land use. The 2025 investment statute excludes certain mining and petroleum activities from its application; a project’s own legal framework must be checked. [Investment and Special Economic Zones Act, 2025; Mining Act; Environmental Management Act]

Zanzibar’s Land Tenure Act, Land Transfer Act, Registered Land Act and Commission for Lands Act form part of a separate framework. The consolidated Zanzibar laws are available through the islands’ land tribunal. Subsequent amendments and current administrative practice should be checked before relying on the 2017 compilation for a specific transaction. [Zanzibar land laws, 2017 compilation]

The Ministry of Lands, Housing and Human Settlements Development and Commissioner for Lands oversee mainland land administration, including allocation, registration, valuation and coordination with local authorities. District and municipal offices support surveying, planning and services. TISEZA facilitates investment and administers investment-related land arrangements. Sector agencies and local authorities can exercise overlapping powers over forests, wildlife, water, mining and planning. Coordination matters because a land certificate, a land-use plan and a resource permit answer different legal questions. [Ministry of Lands, land administration; TISEZA, land acquisition; Water Resources Management Act]

A 2010 Danish Institute for International Studies review documented uneven implementation of rural land institutions after the 1999 reforms, including limitations in local administrative and dispute-resolution capacity. It is historical evidence about the period studied, not a current nationwide capacity assessment. [Pedersen, 2010]

Village councils manage village land subject to the Village Land Act and the oversight role of the village assembly; village adjudication and land-dispute institutions have distinct functions. Their effectiveness depends on resources, reliable records, meaningful participation and accessible appeal. Registration does not automatically resolve intra-household claims, land-use conflicts or unequal bargaining power. [Village Land Act; Huggins and colleagues, 2025]

The Land Tenure Improvement Project (LTIP), approved in 2021 with World Bank financing, supported land administration, digitization and rights documentation in selected areas. Following cancellation of much of the undisbursed credit, its World Bank operation closed early on June 30, 2025, rather than in 2027. Its original targets included one million granted rights, 500,000 customary certificates and one million residential licenses; these are project targets, not proof that the documents have been issued. Its monitoring framework calls for sex-disaggregated results. The e-Ardhi system was launched with the revised policy in 2025. [Ardhi Institute Morogoro, March 2025] The World Bank’s completion report records 421,686 registered certificates at closure, including 366,436 CCROs and 55,250 CROs, and reports 28 percent of certificates issued to women individually or jointly, below its 40 percent target. These are project results, not national totals. The report found progress against revised targets but modest achievement against original targets. Service quality, safeguards, inclusion and sustained updating of records remain important. [World Bank, completion report] [World Bank, 2021; LTIP project document; Ministry of Lands, 2025]

LTIP’s early closure followed the government’s request to cancel more than 70 percent of the original World Bank financing and redirect resources to reconstruction and rehabilitation after El Niño rains and Tropical Cyclone Hadiya. The project’s geographic scope and targets were reduced accordingly. While several revised targets were exceeded, achievement against the original targets was modest.

At closure, the project had supported 273 village land-use plans completed with customary certification processes and another 573 plans that did not proceed to the certification stage. The e-Ardhi land information system was operational in 14 district councils. The completion report says residential licenses were deliberately not pursued; urban parcels were instead formalized through granted rights of occupancy. The World Bank rated the project’s overall outcome moderately satisfactory. [World Bank, LTIP completion and results report]

A randomized evaluation of land certification and village planning in 60 Iringa District villages compared 30 participating villages with 30 comparison villages. Within three years it found improved documentation and perceived tenure security, and reduced reported likelihood of current or future disputes. It found no measurable short-term effects on several outcomes including credit, investment and broader economic well-being. This local result does not establish identical effects nationwide. [LTA impact evaluation, 2021]

Village and customary land

Village land includes land within village boundaries and land recognized through occupation or use under the law. Village land may include individual, family and communal uses. A customary right of occupancy is legally recognized; a certificate of customary right of occupancy (CCRO) records the right and may be issued to individuals or groups. Lack of a certificate is not by itself proof that a customary right does not exist. The terms of a right, applicable law and village rules affect transfers, mortgages and other dealings. [Village Land Act; Huggins and colleagues, 2025]

Grazing areas, water points, forest products and seasonal corridors can support several overlapping users. Recording only cultivated plots may leave shared or seasonal interests less visible. Joint village land-use planning and collective documentation have been used to recognize resources extending across village boundaries, although implementation and inclusion require sustained local capacity. [ILRI, joint village land-use planning]

Obtaining a village certificate and preparing a village land-use plan can help establish village boundaries and allocate uses, while adjudication and registration can record particular interests. Neither process should be treated as creating all rights from nothing: family, group and customary interests may predate registration. Survey accuracy, notification, public inspection and opportunities to correct errors are important where neighbors or mobile users disagree. [Village Land Act; Huggins and colleagues, 2025]

General, reserved and urban land

General land includes land outside village and reserved categories under the statutory definitions, while reserved land is subject to specified public or sectoral purposes. A granted right of occupancy and a residential license are different instruments; the latter should not be presented as equivalent to a granted or customary right. Residents of informal settlements can have legitimate interests even when their documents or planning status are incomplete. Definitions of general land in the two mainland land Acts have been the subject of concern where apparently unused village land is claimed by other authorities. [Land Act; Village Land Act; Tanzania land tenure profile, 2016]

Zanzibar

On Zanzibar, rights of occupancy and their transfer and registration are governed through the islands’ separate laws. Inherited, jointly held and customary or religiously mediated interests may coexist with formal records. Current legal treatment and administrative approvals must be checked in the particular case. [Zanzibar land laws]

The mainland Land Act and Village Land Act provide equal rights for adult women and men to acquire, hold, use and transfer land. The 2023 policy edition strengthens the commitment to equality and no longer subjects women’s inheritance of clan land to customary restrictions in the same way as the prior policy, according to Landesa’s analysis. Yet inheritance, marriage and customary rules can interact in ways that leave widows, divorced women and daughters vulnerable. A certificate bearing a woman’s name is evidence of a recognized interest; it does not alone show that she controls land or proceeds from it. [Village Land Act, section 3; Landesa, 2025; Huggins and colleagues, 2025]

The National Bureau of Statistics reports, using the 2022 census, that 29.2 percent of women and 36.2 percent of men aged 15 and older in Tanzania reported owning land alone, jointly or both. These are individual self-reported ownership measures for the United Republic, not percentages of all land area or solely registered rights. Ownership, access, documentation and decision-making are different indicators. [NBS, Women and Men in Tanzania, 2026, section 10.2]

Village planning and registration can improve recognition but may reproduce inequality if meetings, fees, mapping and adjudication exclude women or if only household heads are recorded. A 2025 research review reports uneven outcomes, influenced by representation, awareness, cost, norms and household power. UN Women describes local work in Ikungi District where 311 women received CCROs in 2024, including 40 jointly with spouses; that local example is not a national result. [Huggins and colleagues, 2025; United Nations in Tanzania, 2026]

A documented joint right is not necessarily equivalent to equal control over a sale, mortgage, harvest or income. Household interviews, separate consultations and attention to single women and women in polygamous households can reveal interests that a household-head approach misses. Registration programs should also consider ongoing transaction costs and how changes after death, marriage or divorce are entered into records. [Huggins and colleagues, 2025; World Bank, LTIP completion report]

For Zanzibar, assess women’s property, marriage and inheritance rights under the islands’ applicable laws and the facts of each case. A government report identifies the Zanzibar Land Policy 2018 and the Land Tenure Amendment Act 2003 among relevant instruments. [Tanzania national report to UN Women, 2024] Sex-disaggregated statistics and research specific to Zanzibar should not be inferred from mainland figures. [Zanzibar land laws; NBS, Women and Men in Tanzania]

Pastoralist and hunter-gatherer communities, including Maasai, Barabaig, Hadzabe and Akie communities, have varied histories and land relationships. Their interests can include mobility between seasonal grazing areas, access to water, forest resources, cultural sites and shared land across administrative boundaries. These uses are not necessarily captured by fixed parcel boundaries or year-round settlement. Recognition of community rights and meaningful participation must be considered alongside sectoral conservation, agriculture and investment decisions. [African Commission mission report; ILRI, joint village land-use planning]

The Village Land Act provides for recognition of customary and group interests, including pastoral uses, and instructs adjudicators not to treat the rights of women or pastoralists less favorably than those of men or agriculturalists. Practical protection depends on accurate mapping, representation of mobile users, fair adjudication and enforcement. Joint planning across neighboring villages can protect shared grazing, but cannot be assumed to resolve all underlying claims or guarantee continued access. [Village Land Act; ILRI, 2024]

Research in Rufiji and Kisarawe draws attention to how decisions about land allocation and resource access can marginalize pastoral users, alongside environmental pressure. This is a finding from particular districts rather than a uniform explanation for every farmer–herder dispute. [Walwa, 2020]

Research on joint village land-use planning reports seven village clusters in Kiteto, Chalinze and Kilosa with shared-grazing agreements covering 211,787 hectares as of 2026. This is a reported program-area measure, not a national inventory. Agreement boundaries and the practical ability to use routes and water remain important. [Rangeland Journal, 2026]

Local communities are not homogeneous. Differences of gender, age, livelihood, residence and social status affect who participates and whose rights are recorded. Documentation programs should identify seasonal, secondary and collective rights as well as individual plots and provide workable ways to contest errors. [Huggins and colleagues, 2025; ILRI, 2024]

In September 2026 the Ministry of Lands reported a target to allocate, survey and document six million hectares for livestock by 2030. It stated that land-use planning had allocated more than 3.6 million hectares for livestock by 2025/26 and that more than 1.3 million hectares in 365 villages had been surveyed and gazetted in that year. These are government-reported figures, not a nationwide assessment of the security of pastoral mobility or access to each site. [Ministry of Lands, September 2026]

Land disputes arise over village boundaries, inheritance, overlapping sales, farmer–pastoralist access to water and grazing, urban development, protected areas, mineral concessions and compensation for public or investment projects. Disputes reflect not only scarcity but differences in political influence, institutions, records and access to remedies. Local mediation can help when parties accept it, but power imbalances and lack of enforceable outcomes may limit its effectiveness. [Tanzania land tenure profile, 2016; LTIP project document]

In Ngorongoro and Loliondo, conservation policy and relocation have generated serious and contested land-rights concerns. The African Commission on Human and Peoples’ Rights, in its report on a 2023 mission considered in 2024, expressed concern that relocation and land redistribution had not consistently respected free, prior and informed consent. It called for meaningful participation and protection of Indigenous communities’ rights. The government has described relocation as voluntary and raised sustainability concerns; affected communities and rights organizations have challenged the conditions and voluntariness of the process. [African Commission mission report]

Research on Ngorongoro by Weldemichel examines how conservation policy, restrictions and representations of land scarcity can alter the conditions of pastoral land access over time. That historical interpretation is distinct from a court finding about a particular eviction. [Weldemichel, 2022]

In April 2026 UNESCO stated that forced eviction is unacceptable and that any voluntary resettlement must respect free, prior and informed consent and inclusive participation. The World Heritage Committee subsequently noted reported presidential commission findings favoring voluntary relocation and requested full consultation, including with those opposed to relocation, and review before any move away from the area’s multiple-land-use approach. These statements should not be read as a final determination of every individual relocation or compensation claim. [UNESCO statement, April 2026; World Heritage Committee decision 48 COM 7B.67]

A separate East African Court of Justice filing concerning Ruaha National Park boundaries records applicants’ allegations of uncompensated loss of village land. The court’s case page identifies a 2023 filing but does not show a judgment; those allegations should not be presented as an established legal finding or as the final status of the case. [East African Court of Justice, Reference No. 46 of 2023]

Legal support can affect whether residents can use formal safeguards. A 2016 IIED report documented Hakiardhi’s training of village land-rights monitors to help community members and local authorities understand land law and respond to disputes, including those involving large investments. The report describes a historical initiative; current information on the network’s size and coverage is limited. [Massay, IIED, 2016]

The Office of the Attorney General reported in August 2026 that a long-running dispute involving 213 farmers, Kilangali village and the Agricultural Seed Agency had been addressed through dialogue, with the agency agreeing to hand over land. That official account describes an agreement; information on longer-term implementation and the perspectives of all affected parties remains limited. [Office of the Attorney General, 2026]

For acquisition elsewhere, the legal question includes the nature of the affected right, whether public-purpose and transfer procedures were followed, valuation, notice, compensation and the possibility of review. Loss of common resources, seasonal access and livelihoods can be difficult to capture in parcel-by-parcel compensation. [Land Acquisition Act; Village Land Act]

Forest, woodland, wetland, coastal and rangeland governance overlaps with agriculture, settlement, conservation and energy. Tanzania’s forests support timber, fuelwood, charcoal, biodiversity, water catchments and livelihoods. Community-based forest management on village land and joint forest management involving state reserves operate through different institutional arrangements; benefits and control depend on the legal designation, management agreement and enforcement in each place. Village land forest reserves and management plans can give villages a role in forest governance, while joint forest management depends on arrangements with the relevant authority. The Forest Act, Cap. 323, is a starting point for identifying the rules that apply. Historical estimates of forest extent or the number of community reserves should not be used as current totals without updated inventories. [Forest Act, Cap. 323] [Tanzania land tenure profile, 2016; Environmental Management Act]

A 2026 qualitative study of Angai Villages Land Forest Reserve found that community participation and local ownership had improved in some respects, while capacity constraints, elite capture and dependence on outside actors limited economic benefits. This is a case study, not a national estimate. It illustrates why the distribution of forest income, accountability to residents and the authority to enforce rules matter alongside formal designation. [University of Dodoma research, 2026]

Climate change can intensify drought, flooding and pressure on grazing, farmland and urban infrastructure, while land-use choices affect ecosystems and emissions. The mainland Environmental Management Act, amended in 2025, includes climate-related institutional provisions. The mainland carbon-trading regulations were issued in 2022 and amended in 2023; they apply within their stated geographical and legal scope. Registration and benefit-sharing arrangements require scrutiny of land rights, informed participation, long-term restrictions and accessible remedies. In a 2025 performance audit, the Controller and Auditor General identified weak monitoring, nontransparent credit pricing and limited oversight of project cost and benefit sharing. These are audit findings for the period examined, not proof that every project has the same problems. [National Audit Office, 2025] [Environmental Management Act; UNEP, 2025 amendment; 2022 carbon trading regulations; 2023 amendment; Controller and Auditor General, performance audit]

Freshwater

Major shared water bodies include Lakes Victoria, Tanganyika and Nyasa, while rivers, groundwater and wetlands sustain domestic use, cultivation, livestock, fisheries, hydropower and ecosystems. The mainland Water Resources Management Act establishes the framework for managing water resources and public participation. Formal permits and basin institutions interact with customary arrangements for water points, irrigation and seasonal access. The Ministry of Water’s 2025–2035 implementation strategy identifies basin water boards as responsible for allocation and water-use permits, and notes compliance and wetland encroachment challenges. Permit systems and local sharing arrangements can operate on different scales; women collecting water, small irrigators and pastoral users may experience the same allocation differently. [Ministry of Water implementation strategy] A land right alone does not settle every question about access to water; competing claims and environmental flows require coordination among users and regulators. [Water Resources Management Act, Cap. 331; Tanzania land tenure profile, 2016]

Commercial agriculture, forestry, infrastructure, tourism, energy and urban development can create employment and revenue, but may also displace residents or restrict access to communal resources. Assessments should identify all affected people, including tenants, women, mobile pastoralists and users of forests and water, rather than only the person named on a title. Disclosure of project boundaries, land-use change, compensation, contracts and grievance outcomes enables independent scrutiny. [Village Land Act; LTIP project document]

A 2017 study by Emmanuel Sulle examined how formal, informal and procedural land rights were negotiated in agricultural investments and how compensation could differ according to whose claims were recognized. It describes the legal and policy context at the time; subsequent investment reforms mean that the study should not be used as a substitute for the 2025 Act. Land Matrix’s historical Tanzania country profile offers a separate source on recorded large-scale transactions, but its figures are not a census of all deals or a current project inventory. [Sulle, DIIS, 2017; Land Matrix, Tanzania country profile]

The 2025 Investment and Special Economic Zones Act establishes TISEZA and provides for an investment land bank. TISEZA explains that noncitizen investors may access qualifying land through derivative rights or other permitted arrangements, subject to applicable laws and procedures. A proposal to transfer village land must be assessed under the Village Land Act and related laws; inclusion in an investment land bank is not evidence that all existing rights have been fairly resolved. The older Tanzania Investment Act, 1997 is no longer the governing investment statute. [Investment and Special Economic Zones Act, 2025; TISEZA, land acquisition; Village Land Act]

Minerals and energy

Gold, gemstones and other mineral resources contribute to the economy and generate competition over surface land, water and environmental quality. Mainland mineral rights are governed by the Mining Act, Cap. 123, as amended. The existence of a mining license does not eliminate the need to examine land access, compensation, environmental assessment and the rights and livelihoods of affected communities. Artisanal and small-scale miners, farmers and pastoralists may use the same landscape in different ways. A qualitative study using 24 gender-separated focus groups at three northwestern Tanzanian mining sites found that participants described different health-related impacts among women, men and younger people. Its findings support assessing gender and age in environmental and health impact processes, but are not a national prevalence estimate. [Leuenberger and colleagues, 2021] [Mining Act, Cap. 123; Environmental Management Act; Tanzania land tenure profile, 2016]

Dar es Salaam and other cities and towns face rapid demand for housing, serviced land and infrastructure. Formal planning and registration coexist with informal transactions, customary claims on peri-urban land, residential licenses and rights of occupancy. Rising land values, weak records and overlapping claims can increase the risk of fraud and displacement. Improving tenure security requires affordable procedures, accessible records and meaningful dispute resolution as well as investment in drainage, roads and basic services. [Land Act; World Bank, LTIP; Tanzania land tenure profile, 2016]

Regularization and upgrading can reduce vulnerability, but they may also impose costs or exclude tenants and residents whose claims are not recorded. Infrastructure and hazard management should be accompanied by notice, fair procedures, compensation where required and consideration of suitable alternatives. Urban agriculture and peri-urban livelihoods deserve attention when land is rezoned or acquired. World Bank urban analysis describes barriers to formal registration and the coexistence of formal and informal land transactions; its historical estimates should not be represented as current administrative counts. [World Bank, Transforming Tanzania’s Cities] [Land Acquisition Act; LTIP project document]

The 2022 Population and Housing Census counted 61,741,120 people in the United Republic, including 59,851,347 on the mainland and 1,889,773 in Zanzibar. These are census counts for 2022, not current population estimates. Population pressure varies substantially by region and is only one factor in land insecurity. [NBS, 2022 census initial results]

NBS reports the 2022 census measure of reported land ownership for adults by sex; it also presents household-level information on documentation for land beneath a main dwelling. These measures use different units and should not be treated as interchangeable. Administrative certificate totals are likewise not equivalent to the number of people with secure rights, and overlapping documents or jointly held rights require careful interpretation. [NBS, Women and Men in Tanzania, 2026]

For SDG 1.4.2 and 5.a.1, distinguish documented tenure, perceived security and women’s ownership or secure rights over agricultural land, including the relevant survey year and population. In 2026, the Ministry of Lands reported that 4,925 of 12,333 villages had land-use plans, or 39.9 percent; this is a planning measure, not a share of people or land with registered rights. [Ministry of Lands, 2026] A recent, comprehensive nationwide count of registered individual and collective customary rights, disaggregated by sex, tenure and location, was not established in this review. LTIP’s original numerical targets should not be substituted for verified outcomes. [World Bank, LTIP; Huggins and colleagues, 2025]

• 2021: The World Bank approved LTIP to support land administration and documentation in selected mainland areas. Published issuance numbers are project targets unless a source reports completed results. [World Bank]
• 2022–2023: Mainland carbon-trading regulations were issued and amended, creating an additional framework relevant to land-based projects. [2022 regulations; 2023 amendment]
• 2025: LTIP’s World Bank operation closed early after the cancellation of undisbursed funds. At closure the Bank reported 421,686 registered certificates, below the original 1.5 million CRO/CCRO target, though above the reduced target. [World Bank completion report]
• 2025: The revised 2023 edition of the National Land Policy was launched alongside e-Ardhi. [Ministry of Lands; Ardhi Institute Morogoro]
• 2025: The Investment and Special Economic Zones Act established TISEZA and replaced earlier investment and zone legislation. [2025 Act]
• 2026: UNESCO reaffirmed human-rights safeguards for Ngorongoro, and the World Heritage Committee called for full consultation and review of proposed changes to the area’s management. [UNESCO statement; Committee decision]
• 2026: NBS published sex-disaggregated land ownership findings from the 2022 census. The source year for the reported ownership measure remains 2022. [NBS statistical publication]

Policy and legal recognition provide a foundation for tenure security, but implementation requires reliable institutions, transparent decisions and access to remedies. Priorities include:

• Recognize and document individual, family and communal customary rights without assuming undocumented, seasonally used or uncultivated land is vacant.
• Protect pastoral mobility and shared water and grazing through inclusive planning across administrative boundaries.
• Make women’s inheritance, marital and occupancy rights effective through legal reform, inclusive adjudication, affordable documentation and accessible legal assistance.
• Publish accessible information on land transfers, investment land banks, compensation and project boundaries, and ensure affected people can contest decisions.
• Strengthen independent and timely dispute resolution, local records, professional capacity and safeguards against corruption and multiple allocations.
• Ensure conservation and resettlement respect community rights, meaningful participation, adequate services and livelihoods, including for people who oppose relocation.
• Improve informal-settlement upgrading and urban planning while protecting tenants and other residents whose rights are not documented.
• Monitor carbon projects, water permits and mining activities for their effects on land access, livelihoods, benefit sharing and environmental quality.

These priorities follow the rights and implementation issues identified in the Village Land Act, the National Land Policy, the African Commission mission report, and research on women’s land rights and pastoral land planning.

Knowledge gaps

Information remains limited on current nationwide certificate issuance and its gender and collective-rights breakdown; the coverage and quality of village land-use plans; actual remedies and livelihood outcomes in individual relocation and acquisition cases; public records of investment land banks and carbon contracts; and recent Zanzibar-specific land and inheritance implementation. Policy intent, project targets and reported compensation should be distinguished from independently verified results.

Primary legal and government sources

• Land Act, Cap. 113, revised edition and 2025 supplement
• Village Land Act, Cap. 114, revised text
• Land Acquisition Act, Cap. 118
• National Land Policy 1995, 2023 edition, Ministry of Lands
• Ministry of Lands, launch of revised policy, March 2025
• Ardhi Institute Morogoro, e-Ardhi launch, March 2025
• Investment and Special Economic Zones Act, 2025, Office of the Attorney General
• TISEZA, land acquisition guidance
• Zanzibar land laws, 2017 compilation
• Water Resources Management Act, Cap. 331
• Ministry of Water, water policy implementation strategy 2025–2035
• Office of the Attorney General, Kilangali land dispute, 2026
• Forest Act, Cap. 323
• Ministry of Lands, village land-use planning, 2026
• Ministry of Lands, pastoral land allocation, September 2026
• Environmental Management Act, Cap. 191
• Mining Act, Cap. 123, 2025 supplement
• Environmental Management (Control and Management of Carbon Trading) Regulations, 2022
• Carbon trading regulations amendment, 2023
• Controller and Auditor General, carbon-trading project performance audit
• National Audit Office, audit summary, 2025

International organization sources

• World Bank, Land Tenure Improvement Project, 2021
• World Bank, LTIP project document
• World Bank, LTIP completion and results report
• World Bank, Transforming Tanzania’s Cities
• African Commission on Human and Peoples’ Rights, Tanzania mission report
• East African Court of Justice, Reference No. 46 of 2023
• UNESCO, Ngorongoro statement, April 2026
• World Heritage Committee, decision 48 COM 7B.67
• United Nations in Tanzania, women’s land rights in Singida, 2026
• United Republic of Tanzania, national report to UN Women, 2024
• UNEP, Environmental Management Amendment Act, 2025

Academic and research sources

• Huggins, Awadalla and Kingamkono, women’s land rights and village land-use planning, 2025
• Pedersen, Tanzania’s land law reform and implementation, DIIS, 2010
• Sulle, land rights and investors in Tanzania, DIIS, 2017
• Walwa, farmer–herder conflicts and pastoral access, 2020
• Weldemichel, conservation and dispossession in Ngorongoro, 2022
• Leuenberger and colleagues, gendered health impacts of gold mining, 2021
• ILRI and CGIAR, joint village land-use planning for shared grazing, 2024
• The Rangeland Journal, joint village land-use planning, 2026
• University of Dodoma, participatory management of Angai forest, 2026
• Iringa land tenure assistance impact evaluation, 2021

Civil society and expert sources

• Landesa, women’s rights and the revised land policy, 2025
• Massay, community land rights monitors, IIED, 2016
• Landesa, revised land policy and rural residents, 2025

Data and indicator sources

• National Bureau of Statistics, 2022 Population and Housing Census initial results
• National Bureau of Statistics, Women and Men in Tanzania, June 2026
• Land Matrix, Tanzania country profile, historical data

Historical reference

Tanzania land tenure and property rights profile, 2016. This historical reference retains detailed information on land, freshwater, forests and minerals; its historical laws, figures and program descriptions reflect an earlier period.

Review note

Updated in October 2026 using legal, government, international, research and civil-society sources. The review incorporates mainland and Zanzibar distinctions, updates the policy and investment framework, and flags evidence gaps.