Tanzania has progressive land and natural resource management policies and laws, which provide a comprehensive framework for enabling local communities to varyingly administer, manage and sustainably utilize their land and natural resources.

This paper provides an overview of these laws and analyses how effective these laws have been, particularly over the last 15-20 years when most were promulgated, in enabling communities to secure tenure over and sustainably manage their common property resources – principally grazing, forests and wildlife.