Introduction

This chapter aims to complement the detailed analysis of land markets in Iringa Region by Elizabeth Daley in the preceding chapter in two ways: through a discussion of women's rights to land in the context of a changing matrilineal/matrilocal framework and a focus on gendered attitudes towards titles as collateral. It aims to show how women as well as men are taking advantage of the flexibility of what is termed the ‘customary system’ to pursue their rights to land. It is argued that the assumed benefits of land titles – enhanced tenure security, creation of a land market, use of land as collateral – also exist in the absence of titles, and that existing practices might indeed be better suited to meet the demands of the poor than registration of land titles.

The geographical focus of this chapter is on the Uluguru Mountains which are the dominant geographical feature in Morogoro Region in East-Central Tanzania as they rise abruptly from the plains to an altitude of about 2600 meters above sea level. There is no consensus on when exactly the first people settled in the Uluguru Mountains. Young and Fosbrooke (1960, 21) date the beginning of human settlement to the end of the sixteenth century, whereas according to Kjekshus (1977 in Hymas 2000) the Morogoro District Book dates first settlement to only some 150 to 200 years ago. There is more consensus over the fact that people of mixed background moved to the Uluguru Mountains because of the increasingly insecure living conditions in the plains. These ‘settlers’ came as individuals or as families and thus the term Waluguru actually refers to a geographical grouping of different clan groups (Young and Fosbrooke 1960, 21–2). The population of the Uluguru Mountains increased sharply from the 1880s onwards as more and more people settled on the mountains, mainly for two reasons: rains were better there than on the plains, and it was easier for people to defend themselves against raiders who were attacking both the caravans which passed the Ulugurus to north and south and also the population in the area (ibid., 23). While offering protection against the raiders, the mountains were still close enough to allow their inhabitants to trade in food with the passing caravans.