KUDOS, UN, FOR PROCLAIMING INTERNATIONAL SWAHILI DAY
On July 7, 1954, the founder of Tanzanian nationalism, Mwalimu Julius Nyerere, adopted Swahili as a unifying language in the struggle for freedom, political independence and national unity.
A little more than 67 years later, the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organisation (Unesco) – declared July 7 “World Annual Kiswahili Language Day” at its 41st Session in Paris this year.
And – perhaps by sheer happenstance or deliberate calculation – July 7 was the date in 2000 when the second East African Community (EAC-II) was re-established after its predecessor (EAC-I: 1967-1977) imploded on July 1, 1977.
This was to rekindle the cooperation and regional integration spirit among Tanzanians, Kenyans and Ugandans where the language is generally spoken. Partly because the language is also spoken in Rwanda, Burundi and South Sudan, the three countries also joined EAC membership.
Swahili is the most widely-spoken language in sub-Saharan Africa, and is a lingua franca in many countries of East, Central and Southern Africa, as well as in the Middle East.
It is indeed among the world’s ten most widely-spoken languages, with more than 200 million speakers worldwide.
Furthermore, Swahili is today taught in many major universities and colleges globally, and is one of the official languages of the 55-nation African Union (AU), the 16-nation Southern African Development Community (Sadec) and the six-nation EAC.
It is, therefore, considered an indispensable tool in achieving all-inclusive, sustainable socioeconomic development in such areas as the UN’s Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs-2030), regional integration – and, soon enough: effective implementation of the African Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA) pact.
And, considering that the UN established a Swahili Unit at the United Nations Radio – and that it is the only African language within the Directorate of the Global Communications at the UN – then proclaiming an annual World Swahili Day was long overdue.
REVISIT RESOURCES HARVESTING
Recent reports that the government and other stakeholders are already moving heaven and earth – and everything else in-between – to functionally exploit the value-chain opportunities in the country’s forestry sector are most encouraging indeed. For example, we reported in these pages on November 26 this year that the Tanzania Forest Conservation Group (TFCG) and the Community Forest Conservation Network of Tanzania (Mtandao wa Jamii wa Usimamizi wa Misitu Tanzania: MJUMITA) have been collaborating with the government in implementing the Conserving Forests (CoForEST) Project, starting in 2019.
Briefly, the project is “designed to contribute to Tanzania’s National Development Vision by supporting domestic value-chains in forest products, including sustainable charcoal and timber harvesting”. This is taking into account the facts that, for example, wanton tree-felling for firewood, wood charcoal, etc., is bad for the environment, while functional harvesting of trees can be truly beneficial.
For instance, a cubic metre of timber processed from a properly-harvested African blackwood species (Dalbergia melanonxylon) can fetch up to $13,000 (roughly Sh29.9 million). Fantastic? You can say that again… Just think of the clearly huge potentials of our God-given natural resources that remain unexploited, are underexploited – or are simply wasted for no good reason at all. We think harvesting our natural resources potential needs revisiting.
