Eastern Arc Mountains conservation starts to pay off

Lushoto. For Tanzania, the Eastern Arc Mountains covering an area of 5,350 square kilometres in 15 districts of Tanga, Kilimanjaro, Morogoro, Dodoma and Iringa regions, mean almost everything.

The mountains mean biodiversity, they mean water, they mean tourism and they mean irrigation farming. In short, they are the heartbeat of the country’s economy.

No wonder the government created a special fund called the Eastern Arc Mountains Endowment Fund (EAMCEF) in 2001 to support community development, biodiversity conservation and research projects which promote sustainable use of natural resources of the mountains.

Biodiversity hotspot

EAMCEF executive director Francis Sabuni says the Eastern Arc is recognised globally as part of one of the 34 biodiversity hotspots characterised by high concentrations of endemic species currently under great threat of extinction.

At national level, he says, the Eastern Arc Mountains forests form major catchment areas which collectively provide water for most of the nation’s coastal communities accounting for 25 per cent of mainland Tanzania’s population of over 40 million and most of the major industries in the country.

He adds that about 60 per cent of Tanzania’s electricity is generated from water sources originating in the forests, including Kidatu, Mtera, Nyumba ya Mungu and Kihansi hydropower stations.

Mr Sabuni says with a $5.9 million funding from the Royal Norwegian government, EAMCEF is implementing a five-year (2011-2016) project dubbed Improving Conservation of the Eastern Arc Mountains Forests of Tanzania.

The EAMCEF chief executive officer expressed his optimism that the project will help to stop unsustainable harvesting of mountain resources.

The scheme is also supported by the government and its development partners, including the World Bank, the Global Environment Facility and the United Nations Development Programme.

Most people living in surrounding rural areas depend heavily on subsistence agriculture and forests for their livelihoods. A growing population is also piling pressure on nature.

Estimates suggest that more than 70 per cent of the original forest cover has been destroyed in the Eastern Arc Mountains forests. Over the past 100 years, large tracts of forest have been converted to farmland, or lost due to timber harvesting and uncontrolled fires.

“The project is based on the understanding that there has been increasing environmental degradation and unsustainable harvesting of resources within the mountains, leading to increased environmental degradation,” says Mr Sabuni.

The Tanga Urban Water Supply and Sewerage Authority (Tanga-Uwasa) says it is ready to team up with EAMCEF towards the protection of Zigi River against illegal alluvial gold miners who are damaging the river—the only source of water for over 270,000 Tanga city residents.

The river that originates in the Amani Nature Reserve in the Usambara Mountains has been adversely degraded following a gold rush in 2003 despite efforts being taken by authorities to protect the river.

Sixty-four-year-old Stanslaus Njovu, the chairman of Shebomeza village adjacent to the Amani Nature Reserve, says during the 2003 gold rush in the reserve it was difficult to control the illegal miners because they used mobile phones to alert one another when authorities launched crackdowns.

“About 10,000 illegal miners from different nationalities across the world invaded the Amani Nature Reserve in search of the precious stones,” Mr Njovu, who has lived in the area since 1968, explains to a team of visiting journalists.

However, he says, authorities conducted crackdowns on the illegal miners, a move that he says helped to save the Zigi River from further destruction.

Kwamkoro area conservator in the Amani Nature Reserve Donald Lubasha says conservation efforts supported by EAMCEF have started to restore damaged biodiversity along the Zigi River.

“Most of the illegal gold diggers have now quit the business and they are now engaged in projects such as bee keeping supported by EAMCEF,” says Mr Lubasha.

Water

Tanga-Uwasa managing director Joshua Mgeyekwa says any efforts aimed at saving the Zigi River are appreciated, adding: “We (Tanga-Uwasa) are ready to team up with EAMCEF and other stakeholders to save the river.”

Mr Mgeyekwa says Tanga-Uwasa has developed a documentary called The Great Zigi River Crocodiles aimed at creating awareness on the need to conserve the water sources.

He says the Zigi River is the only source of water for Mabayani Dam, situated 26 kilometres north of Tanga, covering 233 hectares.

However, the Tanga-Uwasa chief executive officer says the Mabayani water reservoir has been affected by sediments, weeds and hyacinths, reducing its volume from 7.7 to 5.9 million cubic meters in 35 years, which is equivalent to a reduction of 23 per cent due to siltation and “the situation now is alarming”.

He says this situation has been caused by upstream activities, including illegal mining, charcoal making, deforestation and farming.

He says human activities on land upstream result in turbidity and colour of water that increase water treatment costs.

“There was a very significant pollution of water sources in 2009/2010 which raised the cost of water treatment from Sh348.9 million to Sh452.9 million in the previous year,” says Mr Mgeyekwa.

“An average of 12 per cent of the annual operational budget is used for water treatment only,” he says.

According to Mr Mgeyekwa, the Mabayani reservoir was commissioned in 1978 with the capacity of reserving 40,000 cubic metres of water a day but the capacity has gone down to 30,000 cubic metres a day.

“We are all responsible for the future generations. The results from our action now will be appreciated in a long-term as the cost and consequences of doing nothing on conservation of water sources will be immeasurable,” says Mgeyekwa.

Tourism

Amani, Chome, Magamba and Nilo Nature Reserves in Muheza, Same, Lushoto and Korogwe districts, respectively, also found in the Eastern Arc Mountains are magnets for tourists but these reserves are also facing varying degrees of environmental abuse.

EAMCEF is also engaged in forest management and ecotourism activities for biodiversity conservation and improvement of community livelihoods that make the communities in villages adjacent to the reserves to lessen dependence on the forests.

Nilo Nature Reserve, situated 78 kilometres from Korogwe town and surrounded by 16 villages, was adversely degraded by alluvial gold miners and growers of bhang which is an illicit drug in Tanzania.

Nilo Nature Reserve acting conservator Benjamin Hango says growers of bhang invaded the reserve in the 1980s and cultivated more than 100 hectares of the illicit drug.

“Also mining of alluvial gold was rampant between 2009 and 2012 destroying the biodiversity of the reserve,” says Mr Hango.

However, with the support from EAMCEF there is light at the end of the tunnel, says the conservator. He says most of the people who were cultivating bhang and undertaking illegal mining have now quit these evil businesses and they are now engaged in projects supported by EAMCEF such as bee keeping, poultry and fish farming.

Mr Lyimo Haridi, 29, a resident in Kwamkole village, confesses that he was one of the illegal miners but he dropped the illegal business after he was educated on the importance of conserving the reserve.

“Of course another reason that forced me to quit the business was that I was not benefitting. We managed to get a little gold that was shared by many among us diggers,” says Mr Haridi, who is now a member of a village environmental watchdog committee.

“We have started receiving more than 100 tourists a year from across the world. Our reserve is mostly for adventure tourism,” says Hango.

Irrigation farming

Apart from being a unique mountain rainforest in the South Pare Mountains in Same District, Kilimanjaro Region, Chome Nature Reserve known by locals as Shengena Forest, is also a source of water for irrigation of 680 hectares of paddy involving 4,500 farmers.

The farmers under the Ndungu Irrigation Scheme are dependent on Yogoma River whose source of water is the Chome Nature Reserve, covering 14,283 hectares.

Ndungu Irrigation Scheme manager Beda Mitungi says the area comprises alluvial plains and seasonal marshes formed mainly by the Yongoma River. Based on rainfall distribution, the area can be divided into two seasons—the rainy season that starts from November to May and the dry season that starts from June to October.

More than 90 per cent of annual rainfall occurs in the rainy season and amounts to about 660 millimetres on an average, adds Mr Mitungi.

But human activities upstream Yongoma River has affected the flow of water, forcing 73-year-old Issa Shedafa to complain that he now harvests 16 bags of paddy compared to 30 bags he used to harvest 10 years ago.

Ms Maria Msuya, secretary of the Association of Farmers under the Ndungu Irrigation Scheme says harvests have dwindled due to the drop in water flow in the river.

At its peak, the Ndungu Irrigation Scheme produced between 6,000 and 7,000 tonnes of paddy a year.

Frank Mahenge, chief conservator for Chome Nature Reserve, says EAMCEF has released Sh11.2 million as first tranche for conservation management activities of the reserve, including rehabilitation of degraded forest areas, planting of indigenous trees in degraded areas and undertaking forest surveillance.

“The improvement of vegetation cover of the reserve will create a conducive habitat for forest fauna and flora and will also improve water flow,” says Ms Mahenge.

Mr Exper Pius, EAMCEF planning and communication assistant, says Regalia Media Limited, a media consultancy firm based in Dar es Salaam in collaboration with EAMCEF, has launched a programme aimed at publicizing the Fund’s conservation undertakings within the Eastern Arc Mountains.

The projects focus on protected areas boundary management, forest protection, restoration of degraded areas, forest fires management, improvement of eco-tourism infrastructure, forest boundary conflict resolution and maintenance of working facilities.

In addition to funding on protected area management, EAMCEF is also supporting projects that contribute to livelihoods of local people living around nature reserves, says Mr John Kipingili, the EAMCEF field project officer for South Pare and West Usambara.

The projects include tree planting, bee keeping, improved stoves, dairy goat husbandry, butterfly exports, fish farming and poultry keeping.

Lushoto District Council executive director Lucy Msoffe says these projects enable villagers to generate income and lessen their dependence on harvesting natural resources from the Eastern Arc Mountains