Poverty puts future of natural resources in dilemma

By Sylvester Joseph

THE future of natural resources in Dodoma region is in dilemma after abject poverty being experienced by community members has pushed them to invade forests in search for a living.

This condition was unfolded by a team of six environmental journalists from the Journalists Environmental Association of Tanzania (JET) who visited the region last week to see how climate change have affected people from different parts of Tanzania.

During that visit, we managed to visit several villages in Mpwapwa and Chamwino districts in Dodoma, where we discovered that local people in the region derived their living mainly from subsistence agriculture, livestock keeping and charcoal making –activities that put a lot of pressure on forests as they involve tree cutting.

Large areas of forests have been and continue to be modified or transformed by people in order to fit their needs. There is depletion of forest cover through complete conversion into farms, fuel wood, timber harvesting and overgrazing.

We also discovered that there were cases of extinction of tree species due to habitual fragmentation and over-exploitation of such tree species.

The people from these visited villages (Chololo, Chunyu, Songambele “B”, Chibelela and Mvumi Mission) acknowledged that they are feeling the bitter side of the impacts of the woodland depletion. Soil erosion, loss of soil productivity, drying out of water sources and floods which cause sedimentation of rivers and dams are some of the mentioned cases.

According to Chamwino District Administrative Secretary, Anaclet Mushashu, poverty has largely contributed to depletion of natural resources.

“As you may know, Dodoma region lay within the semi-arid part of Tanzania. There are no much economic activities being carried out here that can generate good income to the people. It is unfortunate that when the communities plant their crops, they don’t get enough yields at times due to insufficient rains caused by harsh climatic conditions.

“This has caused poverty to root itself in this area especially Chamwino district. Due to this state of abject poverty, many people have been seeking to get their living from the few remaining natural resources, of which we are talking about trees.

“Though we have been advising the community to grow sorghum that takes a shorter period to mature, millets and “Uwele”, some of them are still adamant. They assist on growing maize,” said Mashashu.

The same idea was seconded by the Central Zone Forestry officer (covering Singida, Manyara and Dodoma) John Masau, who said that there is high level of land degradation in Dodoma Region as a result of over exploitation of natural resources.

“The exploitation level is exceeding the carrying capacity of the land. As a result, in most places in the semi-arid zone there is disappearance of forest cover, scarcity of forest products pressure on remnant natural forest, large areas of potential productive land languishing in a highly degraded state. This has led to decreased production from the land, decreased infiltration and water retention capacity,” said Masau.

“Dodoma is ranked among the four economically incapable regions in Tanzania. The per capita income is estimated to be 154,777/- per annum. It has been facing poverty because of limited economic activities mainly because of harsh climatic and soil conditions,” Added Masau.

Masau claimed that the harsh climatic conditions area exacerbated by unfriendly human activities such as shifting cultivation and wild fire.

“Existing livestock-keeping which is done through free grazing accelerate environmental degradation particularly when the number of cattle exceed the carrying capacity.

“Many people rearing cattle do not agree to reduce the number of their livestock. They believe that having large number of cattle is a treasure. They do it as a bank,” he said.