Customary Tenure Systems Research Articles

Risk Of Eviction And Women’s Technology Adoption: Some Evidence From Southwestern Nigeria

ABSTRACT: In the presence of tenure insecurity that many women face in developing societies because of patriarchal norms, farmers may not adopt farm technologies because there is no assurance of reaping the benefits. This article examines how the risk of eviction affects women’s fertilizer use and adoption of early maturing seed varieties. For the empirical analysis, I employ individual-level data that was collected from 180 women rice farmers in southwestern Nigeria with a multistage sampling technique and analyse the data with both econometric methods that address possible endogeneity issues and those that do not. I analyse the relationship between the risk of eviction and fertilizer use with the Two Stage Least Squares (2SLS) and Ordinary Least Squares (OLS) methods and analyse the relationship between the risk of eviction and the adoption of early-maturing seed varieties with the Two Stage Conditional Maximum Likelihood (2SCML) and probit methods. I find women who are cultivating family-allocated, husband-allocated and purchased plots to be significantly less likely to have fears of eviction than those who are cultivating fixed-rent plots, even as the risk of eviction have different effects on fertilizer use and on the adoption of early-maturing rice varieties respectively. While it makes the women spend less on fertilizer, it makes them more likely to adopt early maturing seed varieties. These would suggest that the women are responding to the unfavourable production environment from tenure insecurity with lower investments in soil fertility and shortened time horizons towards minimizing their losses in the event of eviction. The results also suggest that the women may invest in soil fertility if the operating environment becomes more favourable with better tenure. The policy implications of the findings are thus evident. Women are evidently not averse to adopting farm technologies by default; to thus improve adoption rates of farm technologies, policymakers should adapt technologies to local socioeconomic conditions, while exploring how to make tenancy contracts and the social norms that underpin customary tenure systems more amenable to granting women tenure security. These would help protect land resources from degradation, make agricultural incomes sustainable, and facilitate socio-economic development.

Overlapping land rights and deforestation in Uganda: 20 years of evidence

The majority of the world’s land is held in customary tenure systems, often with overlapping claims. Designing effective policy to reduce emissions from deforestation and degradation requires understanding land management choices within these systems. Using a nation-wide random sample of over 300,000 hectares of forested land in Uganda from 2000 to 2019, we examine how deforestation trends across a system of overlapping rights, known as mailo land tenure, change in response to legal amendments intended to increase land tenure security. Graphical analysis reveals that mailo land has always had higher deforestation rates, compared to private and customary land, which increased relative to other tenure systems beginning in 2010 when a law was passed to protect tenants on mailo land. Statistical analysis controlling for spatial and time effects shows that prior to 2010, trends across tenure systems were similar. After 2010, deforestation increased significantly on land with overlapping rights and then began to decrease after 2017 relative to rates on customary or fully privatized land. We hypothesize that the uptick in deforestation resulted from unintended, increased uncertainty generated by the 2010 law, which changed owner/tenant relations on land with overlapping rights. The decrease in deforestation rates after 2017 was consistent with increased tenure security from an acceleration in the uptake of permanent certificates of occupancy. These findings demonstrate that outcomes under systems of overlapping rights can be destabilized by well-intentioned reform, and that securing tenant rights can reduce deforestation.

Custom, modernity, and stability of land rights in Ghana: An empirico-legal review

Land in Ghana is mostly governed by customary tenure systems. The sole purpose is ensuring the egalitarian use of land resources to secure the welfare of customary families and individuals with common interest in land. However, a confluence of issues including obstinate national policies on land, globalization, and land grabbing, and changing socio-economic context, have synergistically altered the customary regimes with varied and complex consequences for rural land access and use rights. This paper through narrative literature review unpacks the legal regime for customary land governance on the one hand, and empirical studies on the other, to understand the extent of destabilization of the bundle of rights in Ghana’s property rights regime. This review shows the different bundles of rights examined have different levels of stability. Access and use rights remain the most stable, use, and withdrawal rights are under severe stress, while exclusion and alienation rights seek to strengthen chief authority over land. The trusteeship role of chiefs has been replaced by powers resembling absolute ownership, thereby tacitly supporting the alienability of land by chiefs, a development unintended by customary land governance relations.

Variations of Customary Tenure, Chiefly Power, and Global Norms for Responsible Land Investments in Sierra Leone

Abstract In response to debates around land grabbing, the international community has increasingly developed and promoted global governance norms and guidelines for more responsible land investments. This concern on the part of the international community has particularly taken hold in Sierra Leone—in a post-war context, in which international donor agencies are already steering much of the country’s politics. Yet, despite the enormous influence of international guidelines and the actors promoting their use, there is a spatial variation in the conformity to and effectiveness of such norms in cases of land investments. While some projects seem to resemble ‘showcases’ for their exemplary use, these guidelines seem to be absent in other projects. This article analyses the political economy of customary land tenure, land investments, and international ‘soft laws’ in Sierra Leone. Based on 6 months of fieldwork in Sierra Leone in 2019, I compare several cases of large-scale land investments. I argue that there are important variations in the customary tenure system in the degree to which political authority over land is centralized in the authority of the paramount chief or is devolved to landholding families. This, I suggest, holds important implications for the uptake of global norms for ‘responsible’ investments.

Post-conflict restitution of customary land: Guidelines and trajectories of change

Since the 1990s a body of soft international law and public policy has developed around property restitution after conflict. The Pinheiro Principles and the Voluntary Guidelines for the Responsible Governance of Tenure of Land, Fisheries and Forests (VGGT) both proffer remedies for property losses experienced due to violent conflict and forced displacement. These international guidelines for remediating harm caused by property loss or damage in conflict at best only partially address losses in customary tenure systems. This article has two goals: first, to delineate where the international guidelines are out of step with the nature of customary tenure; and second, to identify trajectories of change for customary land tenure systems after violent conflict. These two issues are fundamentally linked. The characteristics of post-conflict environments– contested authority structures, displaced and returning populations, and contentious land relations – make customary land vulnerable to expropriation and elevate the threat of asset loss for customary rights holders. This challenges the assumption that people can always return to rural agricultural livelihoods when displaced from customary land; that is only true if those customary land systems function the way they did before the violence. This article draws on a socio-legal analysis of secondary sources and qualitative data gathered by the authors through focus group discussions and semi-structured interviews in rural communities in Burundi, Liberia, and Uganda over the past decade. Because customary land tenure systems are prevalent over much of the territory currently affected by violent conflict in Africa, the Middle East, and Central Asia, the absence of specific restitution policies for customary tenure systems is a significant gap in international public policy.

Women and Land Tenure in Zambia: Legal and Customary Challenges for Women

Zambia has a dual land tenure system recognized by the constitution and land policy which govern land in all parts of the Country. The Customary system governs the land under the control of traditional leaders while the statutory tenure system governs all land that is titled. In 2021, just before the general presidential and parliamentary elections, a new land policy was launched in Zambia with a 50% provision of land to all women. The new land policy aims at gender equality in land ownership in line with the Southern African Development Community (SADC) and African Union (AU) protocols. This policy has a gender component that deals specifically with the requirement of allocating land to women, the youth and disabled people. Even under statutory land, gender inequalities still remain minimally challenged same despite policy pronouncements which are rarely transformed into political actions intended to deal with gender inequalities in land ownership which is a serious problem among poor women in all the ten provinces. In all these provinces, women are the minority in terms of land ownership in both urban and rural communities. This situation is compounded by the high poverty levels and illiteracy among both urban and rural women. Provisions of gender equity measures in policies are important steps towards gender equality and should be encouraged all the time and policy reviews should equally take on board emerging issues from time to time. However, the current situation in the country of formulating policies with gender inclusive measures seems to be an end itself because policies are not accompanied by practical programmes aimed at dealing with gender inequalities in different locations and remote communities where the customary tenure system remains unchallenged. Government interventions through land policies have achieved some gains but more would have been achieved if deliberate programmes were instituted on land redistribution especially on statutory land to ensure that the disadvantaged groups even among women benefit from policy changes. Ratification of international conventions that are aimed at combating gender discrimination should be accompanied with practical programmes and policies which should be monitored and evaluated from time to time to ensure that practical progress is made in eliminating gender inequalities in land ownership.

A cautionary note for forest landscape restoration in drylands: cattle production systems in northwest Madagascar’s dry forests

ABSTRACT Multiple global initiatives are underway to restore the world’s forests, and more recently, its rangeland ecosystems. Tenure security has been identified as a key enabling factor for successful restoration initiatives. However, in Madagascar, a global biodiversity hotspot, dry forests are considered unoccupied and unowned, even where communities have long-established claims under customary tenure systems. Collective tenure recognition efforts are underway, but limited knowledge on agropastoralist cattle production strategies hampers efforts to develop well-informed tenure reforms. Our qualitative study helps fill this knowledge gap by documenting cattle raising strategies among agropastoralists in northwestern Madagascar, as well as the core elements of semi-extensive and extensive pasturelands. Our analysis reveals the presence of four distinct cattle raising strategies in the study area but suggests that cattle raisers are transitioning away from extensive cattle production toward semi-extensive and intensive alternatives in response to high risk of cattle theft and expanding human settlement. Although our study focuses on Madagascar, the issues we raise are relevant to ongoing efforts throughout sub-Saharan Africa to engage agropastoralists in dry forest restoration and support their livelihoods.

The Land Is Ours: Bottom-Up Strategies to Secure Rural Women's Access, Control and Rights to Land in Kenya, Mozambique, Senegal and Malawi

Despite their key role in agriculture, in many African regions, women do not have equal access to or control and ownership over land and natural resources as men. As a consequence, international organizations, national governments and non-governmental organizations have joined forces to develop progressive policies and legal frameworks to secure equal land rights for women and men at individual and collective levels in customary tenure systems. However, women and men at the local level may not be aware of women's rights to land, and social and cultural relations may prevent women from claiming their rights. In this context, there are many initiatives and programs that aim to empower women in securing their rights. But still very little is known about the existing strategies and practices women employ to secure their equal rights and control over land and other natural resources. In particular, the lived experiences of women themselves are somewhat overlooked in current debates about women's land rights. Therefore, the foundation of this paper lies in research and action at the local level. It builds on empirical material collected with community members, through a women's land rights action research program in Kenya, Senegal, Malawi, and Mozambique. This paper takes the local level as its starting point of analysis to explore how the activities of women (as well as men and other community members) and grassroots organizations can contribute to increased knowledge and concrete actions to secure women's land rights in customary tenure systems in sub-Saharan Africa. It shows three important categories of activities in the vernacularization process of women's land rights: (1) translating women's land rights from and to local contexts, (2) realizing women's land rights on the ground, and (3) keeping track of progress of securing women's land rights. With concrete activities in these three domains, we show that, in collaboration with grassroots organizations (ranging from grassroots movements to civil society organizations and their international partner organizations), rural women have managed to strengthen their case, to advocate for their own priorities and preferences during land-use planning, and demand accountability in resource sharing. In addition, we show the mediating role of grassroots organizations in the action arena of women's secure rights to land and other natural resources.

Investment impacts of gendered land rights in customary tenure systems: Substantive and methodological insights from Malawi

• The impact of individuals’ tenure security under customary regimes is investigated. • The analysis uses a unique survey experiment in Malawi. • Having land rights of bequest and sale increases investment and cash crop adoption. • Women’s land rights joint with local institutional arrangements can amplify the effects. • The effects can be obscured by measurement error associated with traditional data collection. Although most of the world’s agricultural land is cultivated under customary tenure regimes that tend to change over time in response to exogenous factors, the impact of customary rights on productivity and investment remains under-researched. Using unique data from an experiment in Malawi, we show that (i) parcel-level bequest and sale rights affect investment and cash crop adoption; (ii) impacts are gender-differentiated -women’s rights affect investment and men’s cash crop adoption- and vary by inheritance regime; and (iii) measurement error associated with traditional approaches to survey data collection easily obscures these effects. Beyond reinforcing the need for careful empirical research, this suggests that gradual erosion of women’s customary rights may reduce land related investment and that measures other than titling (e.g. changes in family law or legal support) may enhance it.

Land Tenure Dynamism in Yam Farming in the Atebubu-Amanten District, Ghana

Land tenure system in Africa has received extensive research coverage. For years the customary tenure system was regarded as contradictions to development. Researchers and donor organisations, particularly the World Bank, pushed this agenda and called for its replacement with a more efficient land tenure regime that would promote exclusive land use right through land title registration. After decades of the failure of the land title registration agenda to achieve the perceived investment in land, there is a shift to recognise the customary land tenure practices as evolving, negotiable, fluid, efficient and capable of promoting investment and development in land. This paper examines the effects of land tenure dynamism on yam farming in the Atebubu- Amanten District of Ghana. The paper situates the land tenure debate within the context of the evolutionary theory of land rights which argues that land tenure is evolving from communal landholding to atomistic family and individual landholding. The paper argues that the transition to the individual land rights affects the farming system based on shifting cultivation and land fallowing as practiced in the study area. The study concludes that there is a relationship between the land tenure system and the system of cultivation. Therefore, any attempt at land tenure reforms geared towards exclusive land use right through individual titling should take into consideration the prevailing farming system.

Struggles of Women to Access and Hold Landuse and Other Land Property Rights under the Customary Tenure System in Peri-Urban Communal Areas of Zimbabwe

The struggles of women to access and hold landuse and other land property rights under the customary tenure system in peri-urban communal areas is increasingly becoming a cause for concern. These debates are revealed using a case study of a peri-urban communal area called Domboshava in Zimbabwe. Women living in this peri-urban communal area struggle to access and hold landuse and other land property rights registered under their names. The aim of this paper is to present an analysis of the struggles faced by women to access and hold landuse and other land property rights in Domboshava. This paper is a product of a literature review on land property rights, land tenure systems, and peri-urbanity more generally. Field data was intermittently collected in the peri-urban communal area of Domboshava over a period of four years from 2011 to 2014, as well as through post-research social visits stretching to 2019. Thirty-two women were conveniently selected and interviewed. I applied Anthony Giddens’ structure-agency theory as a framework of analysis. The struggles to access and hold landuse and other land property rights by women are rooted in land transactions, social systems including the customary land tenure, patriarchy, as well as the peri-urban context of Domboshava. Responsible authorities on land administration in communal areas need to acknowledge the existence of new and invented ways of accessing and holding landuse and land property rights under the customary land tenure system, as well as to find ways to mobilize more opportunities for women on the peri-urban land market.

Promoting cocoa agroforestry under conditions of separated ownership of land and trees: Strengthening customary tenure institutions in Cameroon

Formal and customary land tenure can encourage the adoption of sustainable land management practices. Yet, certain forms of customary land tenure can deter farmers from practicing agroforestry. One such example is the case of cocoa agroforestry in the Centre region of Cameroon, where cocoa orchards and the fruit trees that grow inside were traditionally inherited separately to different family members. While customary land owners hesitate to allow tree cultivation in their cocoa orchards as they are afraid of losing out while sharing their land, the tree owners would often like to expand the number of fruit trees, but lack the land to do so. This study assessed how various policy instruments can enhance the adoption of agroforestry in this context. Using the Coase theorem, we analyzed seven agroforestry systems of cocoa in association with Safout (Dacryodes edulis), Bush mango (Irvingia gabonensis) and/or Ndjansang (Ricinodendron heudelotii). Land sharing with fruit producers reduced the cocoa mono-croppers’ farm income by 40–80%, while fruit producers benefited especially from the cultivation of Bush mango. According to our baseline Coase theorem results, cocoa agroforestry was socially efficient when 13–60 fruit trees/ha were planted, providing a positive net social benefit (248,753 to 3,394,829 FCFA/ha). The policy intervention scenarios (cocoa certification, payment from voluntary carbon projects and reform of the current customary tenure system) led to more fruit trees being planted (14–71 trees/ha) and increased the net social benefit (266,418 to 5,753,595 FCFA/ha). Both farmer categories gained in each of the scenarios, with the fruit producers benefiting more than the cocoa croppers. Among the investigated policy instruments, a land tenure reform inducing a fair revenue sharing proved to be the most effective in encouraging tree planting in cocoa farms.

Defending Shan State's customary tenure systems from below through collective action research

ABSTRACT Much of rural Myanmar remains under local Customary Tenure Systems (CTS), particularly in upland ethnic areas. Yet CTS lack legal recognition and are increasingly vulnerable to appropriation. This paper examines how, since 2016, communities and civil society organisations (CSOs) across Shan State have organised to document their CTS as a basis for advocacy. Findings confirm CTS remain prevalent and valued, but communities are experiencing increasing pressure, through both gradual erosion, and direct appropriation. Communities and CSOs demand statutory recognition and protections. CTS defence is perceived as a priority element of a wider political process against coercive adverse incorporation and for self-determination.

Smallholder Agricultural Investment and Productivity under Contract Farming and Customary Tenure System: A Malawian Perspective

Land tenure security, especially customary residence systems, is found to influence the agricultural investment decision-making and productivity of smallholder farmers across sub-Saharan Africa. However, as country-specific customary residence systems and farming models evolve over time, their impact on food security and livelihood remains unclear. This study investigates the impact of customary residence systems on both agricultural investment (in tea shrubs and agroforestry) and productivity among contracted smallholder tea outgrowers in Southern Malawi. A survey of 228 farmers was conducted in 2018, and a linear probability and ordinary least squared (OLS) models were used for the analysis. The results suggest that matrilocal residence practices positively influence agricultural investment. The study concluded that despite the dominance of matrilineal-matrilocal systems in Southern Malawi, there is a need for policy to address gender gaps in the region because women are still vulnerable and insecure even in these assumed women-friendly customary systems. It is recommended that future research explores other prevailing tenure security systems.

Gender Dimensions of Youth Access to Agricultural Land Under Customary Tenure System in the Techiman Traditional Area of Ghana

This study investigates youth access to agricultural land under the customary land tenure regime in Ghana focusing on gender dimensions. Using the Techiman Traditional Area as a case study, the study applied multiple sampling techniques in a multi-stage sampling process to select the study communities and the respondents. A total sample of 455 youth respondents comprising 299 males and 156 females were covered in 20 communities. The results from the study revealed that majority of the youth, especially female, accessed agricultural land under non-market mechanisms such as licence, gift and inheritance; while predominantly male youth also accessed land under market mechanisms such as rentals and sharecropping. Both male and female youth held small land sizes. The underlying challenges facing both male and female youth were in two-fold: demand-related such as high cost of accessing land, competition from residential developers and wealthy adult farmers among others, and supply-related such as unwillingness of the elders to release land, scarce productive family land, land grants to outsiders among others. There is the need to ensure a well-functioning land market coupled with credit support system to enable both male and female youth access land. The study recommends further research into youth access to agricultural land under the main customary tenure regimes across the country as a means of formulating an evidence-based youth agricultural land access policy in Ghana.

Peri-Urbanisation Pressure on Customary Land Tenure System and its Management: A Case Study of Kasese Municipality

Peri-Urbanisation Pressure on Customary Land Tenure System and its Management: A Case Study of Kasese Municipality Philly Masereka, Ismail Wadembere Abstract Today’s world is rapidly urbanizing, with radical urban expansion in developing countries. Rapid rate of urbanization has led to an increasing demand for more land for housing, industrial, commercial and agricultural purposes. This land is not available within the already planned cities but at the peripherals where the unplanned customary land is being converted to urban land at a faster rate. This impacts on the peri-urban in terms of changes in land use new forms of household composition, differential access to urban benefits (such as health infrastructure and employment) and increased pressure on land. Current research has mainly focused on the effects of urban sprawl on land cover dynamics hence studies on peri-urbanization and its management on customary tenure system is limited. Therefore, this study focused on examining the nature of developments and how to manage peri-urbanization on customary land in Kasese municipality, Uganda. Used a descriptive research design which uses both qualitative and quantitative methods of data collection and a sample of 88 respondents were selected using purposive, stratified and simple random sampling techniques with the questionnaires and interview guides as the data collection tools. Aerial photographs for the period 1998-2018 were used to compute spatial-temporal changes in the extends of the municipality as a result of urbanization. The study revealed that majority of the developments in the peri-urban parishes are temporally (42.0%) and semi-permanent (40.9%) while permanent structures were only (17%) this is attributed to many factors for example tenure insecurity. It was also found out that majority 86.4% of the respondents did not get plan approval from municipal council to build and this explains the development of unplanned houses which have led to growth of informal settlements. This research through literature suggested and recommended the use of land readjustment an inclusive and equitable peri-urban land development tool that can meet the needs of local peri-urban communities for proper peri-urban land administration and management. Full Text: PDF DOI: 10.15640/jea.v7n2a7

Pursuing gender-transformative change in customary tenure systems: civil society work in Zambia

ABSTRACTThis article examines activities undertaken by civil society organisations in Zambia to create gender-transformative change in customary tenure systems. It is based on primary data collected through interviews and group discussions with NGO representatives, lawyers and women’s rights advocates, chiefs, women leaders, and local community members. The findings show that organisations pursue change by leveraging global and national frameworks and discourses and working with traditional authorities, local magistrates, men and women at the village level. Promoting gender transformative change requires multi-level networking and working across hierarchies of power that extend from the household to the state.

Barriers to equity in REDD+: Deficiencies in national interpretation processes constrain adaptation to context

A national interpretation process involving diverse actors and interests is required to transform global environmental initiatives into policies appropriate to the national or subnational context. These processes of localising norms are critical spaces to formulate equitable pathways to environmental conservation, yet have received limited attention from policy makers and researchers. We explored national policy processes for Reducing Emissions from Deforestation and Degradation (REDD+) in Uganda and Nepal from the perspectives of ‘intermediaries’, state and civil society actors at subnational and national scale who promote the interests of various stakeholder groups. Through think-tank meetings and semi-structured interviews with a range of intermediaries, we uncovered that REDD+ implementation processes in both countries are dominated by international actors, applying a demanding administrative agenda and restricting space for deliberation. Consequently, social aspects of policy were compartmentalised, reduced to technical exercises and local equity concerns inadequately addressed in national REDD+ policies. For example, social safeguards approaches were perceived to lack substantive guidelines to promote equity. Limited national political space to criticise government policy and lack of attention to relevant evidence further restricted ability to address entrenched injustices such as status inequalities faced by marginalised groups. Although civil society organisations choose to maintain official involvement with REDD+, many expressed a possibility they would oppose REDD+ in future, or serious doubts about its design and expected outcomes. Concerns centred on lack of recognition of indigenous peoples’ and local communities’ values, identities, practices and institutions such as customary tenure systems, alongside possible detrimental impacts to decentralised forest governance regimes, well established in Nepal and emerging in Uganda. We suggest features to be enshrined in REDD+ policy for adapting national interpretation processes to become more effective spaces for empowering diverse intermediaries to negotiate and influence localisation of international norms, ultimately to promote more equitable pathways to reduced deforestation and degradation.

Norm Entrepreneurs Sidestep REDD+ in Pursuit of Just and Sustainable Forest Governance

This paper explores the dissonance between conceptions of justice among forest-adjacent communities and their representation in global forest policies, a persistent barrier to delivering just sustainability. We empirically track justice claims of rural villagers upwards through specific intermediaries or ‘justice brokers’: civil society, state, or private sector actors operating at local to international levels, who navigate different institutions to advance various social and ecological interests. We draw on interviews with 16 intermediaries in each of Nepal and Uganda and find that recognition of local values and practices such as customary tenure systems are key justice concerns of forest-adjacent communities in each country. However, intermediaries perceive a low likelihood of advancing those claims through national or international climate and forest policy debates, such as REDD+ (Reducing Emissions from Deforestation and forest Degradation), in large part because deliberations on justice are subordinated to concerns such as carbon accounting and arrangements for distributing monetary benefits. This suggests these policy processes must be modified to offer potential for transformational pathways. Intermediaries who pursued recognition justice issues developed innovative tactics in alternative forums. These ‘norm entrepreneurs’ adopted a suite of complementary strategies to attain influence, including: (1) formation of associations at the grassroots level; (2) media and advocacy campaigns through national coalitions to reach powerful international donors, and; (3) drawing on international support networks for advice, training and to influence national government. In both Uganda and Nepal these strategies were evidenced to enhance recognition for local values and practices.

Harvest and trade of caterpillar mushroom (Ophiocordyceps sinensis) and the implications for sustainable use in the Tibet Region of Southwest China

Ethnopharmacological relevanceCaterpillar mushroom (Ophiocordyceps sinensis) is a unique medicinal fungi which is only found in alpine grasslands in Himalayan mountain regions and the Tibetan Plateau. Known locally as Yartsa Gunbu, it has been widely used in Tibetan and Chinese Medicine for centuries. It is crucial to understand local commercial harvest and trade practices of caterpillar mushroom to support the sustainable management of this valuable resource. However, data derived from empirically grounded research is currently limited, particularly in China. Aim of this studyThe research aims to provide the most up-to-date insights into caterpillar mushroom harvest and trade in the main production area of the Tibet Region in Southwest China and to generate policy recommendations for sustainable use. Materials and methodsThe research was conducted in 2015–2016 in six Tibetan communities located in two counties in Diqing Tibetan Autonomous Prefecture, Southwest China. Quantitative and qualitative data were collected from in-depth interviews with local households engaged in caterpillar mushroom harvesting (n = 157), local caterpillar mushroom traders (n = 14), and from focus groups discussions (n = 5) with regional caterpillar mushroom industry stakeholders. ResultsThe research found large regional- and community-level differences in caterpillar mushroom harvest practices. The harvest practices of communities involved in the co-management of a Nature Reserve were more sustainable than those communities not involved in such a scheme, and this was due to the external support and training provided via the co-management scheme. Moreover, a customary tenure system was proving effective for avoiding competition over caterpillar mushroom collection. However, in both counties, narrow marketing channel and non-grading system in trade limits the possibility of improving the local benefits generated from the commercial harvest of caterpillar mushroom. Meanwhile, the local traders play an important bridging role in the value chain and generate greater benefits from product grading. ConclusionTo support the sustainable management of the caterpillar mushroom industry in Southwest China, the prefectural governments should invest in training on appropriate harvesting techniques and the dissemination of market information. It is also critical that prefectural governments recognize and support the customary tenure system of mushroom collection to avoid competition between collectors.