Land tenure and agricultural development in Zaire, 1895-1961

The first is that the agricultural system throughout most of Zaire is that of shifting cultivation. This means that a man will cultivate a plot of land only temporarily and will change plots at regular intervals. The second factor is the population density is low throughout most of Zaire, which means that since new plots are easily found, a man has little interest in retaining permanent rights in any given piece of land. The land tenure system must therefore be flexible enough to accommodate the needs of shifting cultivation as well as changes in population due to natural increase or migration. Despite the diversity of indigenous land tenure systems in Zaire, there are certain fundamental elements that are common to the vast majority of them. The diversity often shows variation on common themes rather than fundamentally different approaches, thus making it possible to generalize about land tenure in Zaire. This paper first looks at the common themes and then presents four case studies which will both illustrate the themes and test the validity of the generalizations.