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turning to other income sources as for coping strategies. The former involves thediversification of crops and lands, as well as size of households, while the latterinvolves compensating by paid labour, sell possessions etc. Probably the mostinteresting finding however, is the great importance of the forest as a copingmechanism.7.4 Policy and institutional contextIt is not only natural, human, physical, financial and social capital which determineshow people structure their livelihoods and to which degree of sustainability. Thepolicy and institutional context also plays a part, and although they are out of thedirect control of the individual household, these are factors which the householdshave to relate to and take into consideration when shaping their livelihood strategies.Given this fact we will in this section highlight what we see as the most relevant legal,administrative and socio-cultural factors influencing the livelihoods in our study area.And since much of the sources from which the households create an income comesfrom natural resources such as agricultural land and forests a particular emphasis willbe placed on how their access to these sources are regulated and how they eitherenable or limits the households livelihoods. And as we are highly interested invariations between our three pilot villages the particularities within each will be ofmain focus.7.4.1 Formal Institutions and Legal frameworkAccording to Causin (1997, p.61), “formal institutions are those backed by law,implying enforcement of rules by the state, while informal institutions are upheld bymutual agreement, or by relations of power and authority, and rules are thus enforcedendogenously”.Within the Tanzanian legal framework there are particularly two set of policies andacts which to a large extent influences the access villagers have to land and forest,namely the Village Land Act No.05 of 1999 and the Forest Act of 2002. As stated bythese two acts all land within village boundaries is under the management of a VillageCouncil which is supposed to give out and set aside land for agriculture, and whateverforest is within the village boundaries (which is not state protected) also fall under the211