ERYTHREA - AGRICULTURAL ECONOMY IN GENERAL 



The jurisdictory regulation of the lands is the subject of Clause I. of 

 the ro3'al decree o^ 31 January 1909, which establishes that propert}^ in 

 the colony's soil belongs to the Italian State, the rights being safeguarded 

 which belong to the native population, as well as those which may belong 

 to third parties as the result of a title emanating from the Italian govern- 

 ment or recognized by it (Article I). The rights of the native population 

 to the land they enjoy in conformity with old local customs will be res- 

 pected (Article 2). The public domain includes roads (railways and cart and 

 caravan roads), the seashore, the ports, gulfs and beaches, military stations 

 and fortresses, telegraph and telephone lines, and in general all property 

 intended for public use (Article 3). The domain includes surface and 

 subterranean watercourses, the chief dividing lines of waters and natural 

 springs. Only a right to use the waters can be granted, and such use is 

 alwa^^s subject to the exigencies of public interest, in the measure of the 

 property's need. Otherwise the waters belong to the domain. No works of 

 deflecting or gathering the waters can be executed without the government's 

 express authorization. 



The colony's domain of which disposal may be made includes : 



a) lands which were recognized before the Italian occupation as be- 

 longing to earlier governments ; 



b) lands formerly belonging to native tribes, parts of tribes, races or 

 families now extinct ; 



c) lands abandoned for more than three years by the native tribes, 

 parts of tribes, races or families to which they belonged ; 



d) lands in the various circumstances in which according to native 

 custom they devolve on the State ; 



e) lands which reached the condition of confiscated property ; 

 b) woods and forests ; 



g) mines, quarries and salt-mines ; 



h) lands frequented by populations practising migratory pasturage, on 

 which however the rights to pasturage and to the waters of such popula- 

 tions must always be respected within the limits prescribed by necessity; 



i) the gulti (fiefs) constituted for ofiices, individuals, families or de- 

 termined religious organtizations, on which however the customary usufruct 

 of fixed populations (i) must be respected within the limits prescribed by 

 necessity ; 



/) in general all lands not comprised under Articles 2 and 3, those of 

 which Article i treats being reserved. 



The lands of which there is question in Article 2 may be resumed bj' the 

 State, and assigned according to circumstances to the public domain or 



(i) As regards tliis provision il should be noticed that if the giilti affect private- proixrly 

 (^-^s/f) itdotsnotadrlaninchof land tothedoniain. Ifhowcvcr it affect lanels which may really 

 be disposed of, the authority to dispose of them is inactive since all such lands, whtilur gulii 

 or not, belong to the domain. The onlj' declaration that had to be maele was that the rights 

 of gulti were abolished, the gultegna being thus deprived of all excuse for reclining any tithe, 

 tribute or other feudal due 



