Key Issues For The Mbomipa Project

MINISTRY OF NATURAL RESOURCES AND TOURISM WILDLIFE DIVISION & TANZANIA NATIONAL PARKS in collaboration with IRINGA DISTRICT COUNCIL

MBOMIPA PROJECT Matumizi Bora ya Malihai Idodi na Pawaga Sustainable Use of Wild Resources in Idodi and Pawaga

KEY ISSUES FOR THE MBOMIPA PROJECT Report No.MMN3 February 2000

by Martin Walsh, MBOMIPA Project

MBOMIPA Project Iringa District Natural Resources Office P.O.Box 398 IRINGA Tel: 061-702686; Fax: 061-702807 E-mail: [email protected]

CONTENTS

ACRONYMS & ABBREVIATIONS

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MAP OF THE PROJECT AREA

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INTRODUCTION

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KEY ISSUES RELATING TO THE ACHIEVEMENT OF PROJECT OUTPUTS

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REFERENCE

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ACRONYMS AND ABBREVIATIONS

AA

Authorised Association

CBC

Community-based Conservation

CBO

Community-based Organisation

DFID

Department for International Development (U.K.)

DNRO

District Natural Resources Officer

DSC

District Steering Committee (of MBOMIPA)

GCA

Game Controlled Area

HIMWA

Huduma ya Injiri na Maendeleo ya Wafugaji (‘Gospel Service and Pastoral Development’)

HQs

Headquarters

LM GCA

Lunda-Mkwambi Game Controlled Area

MBOMIPA

Matumizi Bora ya Malihai Idodi na Pawaga (‘Sustainable Use of Wild Resources in Idodi and Pawaga’, 1997-)

MEMA

Matumizi Endelevu ya Misitu ya Asili (‘Sustainable Development of Indigenous Forests’, 1999-)

NGO

Non-government Organisation

NR

Natural resources

PRA

Participatory Rural Appraisal

REWMP

Ruaha Ecosystem Wildlife Management Project (1992-96)

SMUWC

Sustainable Management of the Usangu Wetland and its Catchment (1998-)

TANAPA

Tanzania National Parks

VGS

Village Game Scouts

VNRC

Village Natural Resource Committee

WD

Wildlife Division

WMA

Wildlife Management Area

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KEY ISSUES FOR THE MBOMIPA PROJECT

1 INTRODUCTION The notes reproduced below have been prepared in advance of the project’s Output to Purpose Review, scheduled to take place in February and March 2000. I am grateful to project colleagues for their inputs and to Ande Mallango, the Iringa District Natural Resources Officer (DNRO), for his comments on the first draft of these notes.

2 KEY ISSUES RELATING TO THE ACHIEVEMENT OF PROJECT OUTPUTS The following summary of key issues is related to outputs in the revision of the project’s logical framework, as recently proposed (Walsh et al. 2000). OUTPUT 1: Appropriate institutional framework for community-based conservation (CBC) established in Idodi and Pawaga The project’s approach to date has been to reform (in some respects radically) and develop further three formal institutions, all of which were first introduced under the former project, REWMP. These institutions are (1) a District Steering Committee (DSC) representing the interests of different stakeholders; (2) Village Natural Resource Committees (VNRCs) as recognised Sub-committees of village government; and (3) teams of Village Game Scouts (VGS) employed by each VNRC. It is widely agreed that the latter (2 and 3) are appropriate and necessary for CBC at village level: the problems they face are primarily operational and linked to capacity (see under OUTPUT 2). It could be argued, however, that such problems are inevitable in village-level institutions given prevailing demographic and other conditions (e.g. the relatively small pool of educated / experienced personnel available for election to office). The project has made little attempt to explore the NR management potential of community institutions which are not part of village government, e.g. of CBOs and/or representative institutions at ward or higher levels. The appropriateness of the DSC is rather more readily questioned. As currently constituted it does not effectively represent the interests of all 16 villages and VNRCs, despite the best efforts of the 5 ward councillors who are committee members. Nor does it appear to be sustainable: the DSC is very much project-driven, and also relies heavily on the part played by a committed and enthusiastic chairman (the District Commissioner). During the REWMP-MBOMIPA transition the former DSC (chaired by the District Executive Director) largely stopped functioning in the absence of project participation and supervision, and it is not difficult to imagine the same happening again. It has to be admitted that there remains a large gap in the institutional framework which – with less than two years to go – we are not sure how to fill. This problem is not specific to MBOMIPA, but is a critical issue for the establishment of Wildlife

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Management Areas (WMAs) nationwide. What institutional and legal form should the ‘Authorised Associations’ (AAs) envisaged by the Wildlife Policy (1998) take? How should the separate and joint interests of villages in a single WMA be represented? What institutional role should different government and private and voluntary sector stakeholders play, if any? These and related questions were raised and discussed during the Wildlife Division’s recent (December 1999) workshop on WMA Guidelines, in Arusha. However, no definite conclusions were reached in the workshop, but are expected to emerge in follow-up work. MBOMIPA will be bound by whatever decisions are eventually made and codified in the projected guidelines. These guidelines are not expected to appear before the second half of 2000. At the very least it is likely that the project will have to modify or replace its DSC in keeping with these guidelines. It is possible that extensive changes will be required at other institutional levels as well (e.g. at the level of the AA). Whatever the case, little time will be left to the project to develop and test new structures (perhaps little more than a year) – and the project cannot experiment itself before the relevant guidelines have been issued.

OUTPUT 2: Village and district stakeholders’ capacity to sustainably manage NR in Idodi and Pawaga enhanced Capacity-building activities have so far focused primarily on the provision of training and advice to village government officers, VNRCs and their VGS. Considerable progress has been made, recalling that the latter two institutions have largely been developed from scratch and that village governments have had minimal exposure to these kinds of training before (including training in financial management). Ongoing assessment of the impacts of this village-level training show a mixed picture. There have been many positive developments, e.g. the removal of corrupt office holders in many villages, the improved capacity of VNRCs to keep financial and other records, and in the organisation and efficiency of the VGS. It is also evident, however, that a lot more training is required, especially in the specifics of NR management. A start has already been made in this direction with the completion of participatory land use planning exercises in most of the villages; while training in participatory NR monitoring is scheduled to begin later this year. One particularly difficult set of problems relates to the politics of NR management at local level. Since REWMP, villages in the project area have been empowered to benefit from wildlife utilisation in ways which they were not able to in the past. In this respect there has been a real transfer of power to the villages. However, the distribution of this power at village level has itself become an issue, involving struggles over control of the resources deriving from village empowerment. This phenomenon manifests itself in a number of ways, e.g. in conflicts between VNRC and other village government officials, in conflicts between over-zealous VGS and resource users, and in the reluctance of village and other local government officials to elicit the full participation of some user groups (including local pastoralists) in the decision-making process. Ironically, the growth of ‘good governance’ noted above (removal of corrupt office holders), may be as much a side effect of these struggles over power as of any newly-learned commitment to accountability in NR management.

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Such political struggles, although a ‘natural’ feature of community life, may place serious obstacles in the way of capacity building, not to mention of effective and equitable NR management itself. The PRA teams involved in the village land use planning exercises encountered and reported on numerous cases of conflict and/or lack of participation. The empowerment of villages (meaning village governments and the individuals controlling them) must be followed up by the empowerment of the villagers within them. This is, of course, already the theory of village government in Tanzania (where the village government is accountable to the village assembly), but not necessarily the practice. One solution to this problem is to focus on minimising the conflicts themselves. The project has already started on this tack, by helping the different village institutions involved to define their roles and responsibilities, as well as their relationships to one another and other stakeholders. The projected next step is to raise awareness and develop capacity among these other stakeholders, including difference resource user groups in the villages themselves. A conservation education programme for primary schools in the project area has been initiated, but work with other community groups has yet to begin. A second possible approach to the problem might be to emphasise instead the development of capacity at higher institutional levels, e.g. in whatever mechanisms might be developed for representing the interests of villages / community stakeholders acting as an ‘Authorised Association’. This depends very much, however, on the recommendations that come from the WMA Guidelines; it seems almost certain that many aspects of NR management in a WMA will remain ‘villagised’ and therefore directly subject to the uncertainties of village politics. To the extent that the forthcoming guidelines modify the institutional framework then the project will have to adapt its training programme. Capacity building for district staff has so far been largely limited to on-the-job training, active participation in workshops, consultancies and study tours, and PRA training for the land use planning exercises. The project’s partnership with District Community Development staff has undoubtedly been the most fruitful in this respect. A more systematic programme of training for district and other government staff is to be developed shortly (activity 2.4 in the revised logframe). The project must also take care to develop exit strategies in the context of its capacity building activities. Reference has already been made to questions about the sustainability of the District Steering Committee in its present form. The project is also intervening actively to help other institutions – especially in organising and planning the finances of the VGS – and has to consider carefully how these activities will continue in the absence of project support.

OUTPUT 3: Sustainable utilisation of NR in Idodi and Pawaga ensured When MBOMIPA was being planned, it was widely assumed that the critical factor in sustainable utilisation would be the controlled offtake of game animals, leading to population increases and therefore larger hunting quotas. Though still important, this has turned out to be something of a simplification.

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Last year the project completed its first wet and dry season aerial surveys of game in and around the project area. The results – which have also been compared with the results of REWMP surveys – have proved much more difficult to interpret than anticipated. While most surveyed animal populations appear to have either remained stable or increased, some of the seasonal comparisons do not make ready sense (showing more animals in the survey area in the wet season than the end of the dry). One possibility is that the increasingly severe seasonal drying of the Great Ruaha is driving animals well away from the river at the end of the dry season (the dry season survey was undertaken in October) – many of them out of the Ruaha valley (including LM GCA) and above its escarpments. If true this would be a disturbing consequence of the problem which initiated the DFID-funded SMUWC project (Sustainable Management of the Usangu Wetland and its Catchment). The impact of game distribution patterns on hunting success remains, however, to be analysed; and further aerial surveys are required to check the validity of and other possible explanations of the patterns observed in 1999. That said, hunting appears to be better controlled in LM GCA than it ever has been. Work will begin on the development of a participatory monitoring programme at village level in the coming dry season. There are, nonetheless, some problems. Elephant poaching for ivory appears to be on the increase in the Ruaha ecosystem as a whole: it is suggested that this is a function of the relaxation of controls on ivory sales in southern Africa. Within LM GCA poaching (as well as illegal forest use) is reported to be a particular problem in the Mkupule area (the District hunting block which has been managed with the help of the Ruaha Conservation Group for the past three years). The illegal hunting pressure here comes from different directions: from resident hunters (and poachers) from Iringa, Mufindi and elsewhere, and from the Rujewa-based tourist hunting company which holds the concession for the Utengule GCA in Usangu, Mbarali district. Some of the resident hunters appear to be gaining access to Mkupule with the continuing support of corrupt government staff in different neighbouring districts; while the Usangu hunters have claimed, wrongly, that gazettement of the new Usangu Game Reserve allows them to hunt in the Mkupule area. Apart from completing baseline surveys and supporting minor interventions (especially in beekeeping), the project has made relatively little progress in other NR sectors. In these sectors (forestry, beekeeping, fisheries) the project has perhaps expected too much of its district partners, who themselves have been waiting for the project to take the lead. The illegal and/or unsustainable use of vegetation resources in the project area is a particular cause for concern, as are allegations that some local government officers are benefiting personally from this situation. Efforts to engage the participation of an NGO in forestry training and management have not progressed, and it is still too early for synergies with the new Danish-funded MEMA project (which is promoting community forest management in areas adjoining the MBOMIPA project area) to have developed. There are plans, however, for joint planning to take place between the two projects and the DNRO’s office. Rather more progress, however, is being made at village level as a result of the nearly completed participatory land use (and natural resource management) planning exercises. These have involved district and extension staff working across a range of

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sectors, including agriculture and livestock staff. Following the development of agreed village plans, it is important that the momentum of this exercise is maintained through regular follow-up and monitoring. This work is very much preliminary: a considerable amount needs to be done before villages (and district staff) can plan and legislate land use to the extent envisaged in recent national legislation and guidelines. Implementation – and assessment of the impacts - of the new Land and Village Land Acts remains a task for the future; as does the development of strategies to settle or at least reduce major land use conflicts in the project area. It might be added here that the initial hope that MBOMIPA could work closely with a local pastoralist NGO, HIMWA, has virtually collapsed following the virtual collapse of the NGO itself. A particular challenge to the project is the need to plan the management and utilisation of shared NR in the GCA. When the project began, hunting was the main form of utilisation taking place. Sale of the resident hunting quota and the sharing of licence receipts from tourist hunting remain the principal sources of village income. Tourist investment, however, now offers a possibly lucrative alternative, and pressure to develop tourist facilities in the GCA has come much earlier than was originally anticipated when the project was being planned. Following one notably clumsy attempt by a tourist operator to secure a campsite in one of the hunting blocks, it was decided (by the DSC) that any tourist investment in the GCA should await proper planning and the production of guidelines for investors. Particular emphasis was placed on the need to zone activities so that conflict between different forms of utilisation would not occur (including conflict with the stipulations of Ruaha National Park’s General Management Plan); as well as the need to determine how the benefits of investment might be shared between villages. The project’s original intention was to undertake this planning itself with the district (DNRO’s office) and assistance of staff from TANAPA and Wildlife Division HQs, so that guidelines would be ready and could be acted on by investors in early 2000. This plan has since been overtaken by the process initiated at national level by the WD, which will culminate in the publication of guidelines for the establishment of WMAs. The WD has advised that tourist investments should not be initiated prior to the guidelines and their recommendations being made public, perhaps sometime during the second half of 2000. This means that although the project can continue to work informally on this issue, it is unlikely that investors will be given any kind of go-ahead to initiate activities in the GCA before 2001 (once the 2000 hunting season has come to an end – hunting being the only form of utilisation which can be planned before next June). This timing creates a serious problem for the project. In addition to its potential for raising more revenue, tourist investment raises a number of difficult and contentious concerns. It is unlikely that these will be resolved in a single season, which may be all that the project is left with once tourist investment starts properly in LM GCA (i.e. before project end in October 2001). Far too little time will be available to develop the capacity of villagers and other stakeholders to negotiate effectively with potential investors or to develop (adapt) investment plans in the light of growing experience. This increases the risk that villagers will be exploited by unscrupulous investors and that unsustainable development of tourist investments will take place, as has happened elsewhere in Tanzania in the past. The risk will be even greater if important elements of the institutional framework are still new or evolving (see above). It may help to

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recall that the current agreements over utilisation (the annual sale of the hunting quota) were reached only after a long and difficult period of negotiation in 1997, reinforced in subsequent years. In some respects these agreements remain fragile, and may well require extensive renegotiation and revision in the near future. It is likely that negotiations over tourist investment will require at least the same degree and intensity of external involvement in the early stages.

OUTPUT 4: Community benefits from NR utilisation increased Revenues from the sale of the hunting quota have continued to rise (total sums raised for 9 villages and the district: 1996 – Tsh.5,105,720; 1997 – Tsh.8,200,000; 1998 – Tsh.13,304,000; 1999 – Tsh.15,000,000)1. The rate of increase is, however, slowing, and there seems to be no immediate prospect that the resident hunting quota will realise the value it would if it were a tourist hunting quota. Caution must be taken, however, with this kind of comparison: it is doubtful whether the project area could sustain tourist hunting at present. Revenues from tourist hunting in Lunda North have not increased over the past year (total sums distributed to 7 villages: 1997 – Tsh.1,750,000; 1998 – Tsh.4,128,060; 1999 – 4,106,500). A substantial proportion of the funds received by the district are retained by it (approximately a third of the total received in 1999), and some concerns have been expressed over the use of this money and how it is accounted for. Similar concerns have also been raised with respect to the funds received by the district from the sale of the hunting quota for the Mkupule district block. This issues remains to be followed up and resolved. Another set of concerns relates to the way in which Pawaga village funds have been allocated to particular development projects: how participatory has decision-making been? These two remain the main sources of income for project villages. The development of tourist investment could, as noted above, bring further revenue to the villages and district. Increasing revenue is only one side of the equation. It is especially important to ensure that village funds from NR are properly used, and that a substantial proportion of income is allocated to community development projects approved by and of benefit to the villagers. The project is therefore investing considerable energy in helping villages to plan and manage their NR enterprises. An important challenge to the project is to develop ways in which benefits at household level can be assessed and if possible quantified. The revised logframe assumes that they can. Although work on this problem is only just beginning, the project has the potential to contribute to ongoing efforts to understand and devise effective measures of the impacts of different aspects of NR management and utilisation on rural livelihoods.

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The figures in this and the following paragraph have been rounded to the nearest Tsh.10.

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OUTPUT 5: Agreed strategy to convert LMGCA into WMA This output, like others, will be affected by the WD guidelines for the establishment of WMAs, currently being prepared (see above). Otherwise preparatory work is scheduled to begin in the next quarter (under logframe activity 5.1). The possible consequences of the gazettement of the Usangu Game Reserve are still being assessed by the districts concerned (the boundaries have yet to be surveyed on the ground). So far this has not affected project activities, though it is an issue which must be resolved if this logframe output is to be achieved.

REFERENCE Walsh, M.T., Bikurakule, D., Mutabiilwa, J., and Ngomello, K.A.S. (2000) Proposed Revision of the MBOMIPA Project Logical Framework, Report No.MMN2, MBOMIPA Project, Ministry of Natural Resources and Tourism, Iringa.

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