Other so-called informal land tenure systems apart from customary land
tenure are religious, neo-customary and extra-legal land tenure systems
(Wehrmann 2008). Initially established to safeguard access to land by all
members of an exclusive and subsistent peasant society, featuring religious
or spiritual character, customary land tenure is based on the idea
of common property. Current formal or statutory land tenure systems,
however, focus primarily on state and/or private property. Neo-customary
land tenure systems are newly introduced land delivery systems that copy
some of the characteristics of customary systems or disguise as quasi
customary. Land tenure systems are called extra-legal when they are legitimated
within the group but are neither based on statutory nor on customary
law. The transition from extra-legal to criminal land distribution
practices is fluid and solely dependent on legitimacy. Whenever informal
land tenure systems coexist with formal ones, land conflicts can easily
arise. This has to be taken into consideration when entering into land use
planning.