Tanapa outlines plans to protect Great Ruaha River
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Plans to rescue the river include, improving infrastructures and providing citizens with alternative means to earn income, according to him.
Mwanza. The Tanzania National Parks Authority (Tanapa) has plans on the cards to protect the Great Ruaha River.
Tanapa Southern zone senior commissioner, Mr Christopher Timbuka said unfriendly human activities have put the river under 'alarming stress’ of worryingly long dry.
The plans afoot to rescue the river, include, improving infrastructures and providing citizens with alternative means to earn income, according to him.
Dr Timbuka, was speaking in Mwanza during a seminar gathering editors and senior journalists said the river could go dry for six months per year.
“Previously, the river was flowing throughout the year. Plans to improve tourism in the southern circuit simultaneously with shaping of infrastructures in game reserves and provide citizens with alternative means to earn money,” he noted.
The Great Ruaha River is located in the south-central of the country flowing through the Usangu wetlands and the Ruaha National Park east into the Rufiji River.
Its basin catchment area is estimated to be 83,970 square kilometres, with population in the basin mainly sustained by irrigation and water-related livelihoods such as fishing and livestock keeping which have become a great challenge to river’s sustainability.
