HEROES OF ENVIRONMENT

The world's environment is at great risk today compared to some years ago. Human beings are witness of drying rivers, the raising of the sea level, increasing of heat and frequent occurrence of natural hazards; all these are caused by various Human activities. However, many people are still conducting their activities without environmental conscious, few individuals and groups of people haven emerged as environmental Heroes, among them are Mzee Joachim and Haraa villagers.

WEALTH UNDER MARINE RESOURCE

For the societies along Mtwara coast belts oysters are famous fish type for their daily consumption. However, these fish category are very unique and important for wealth generation, this is due to availability and reproduction of peals within them that used for ornamental purpose.These fish are naturally found in the sea but nowadays fishermen/women in Collaboration with KIMWAM “Mtwara People’s Umbrella Organization” has started human controlled oyster production, which insures availability and controlled peals development in the farm till the harvesting season.

THE CRY OF MTUNGUTU FOREST!

On the way to Arusha through Kondoa road in Bahi district, there is a large natural forest known as Mtungutu. It is one of the largest forests in Dodoma region. It consists of various species of trees that endures semi arid climatic condition. It covers three villages; Zanka, Mundemu and Babayu. It also consist a variable species of wild animals like antelopes, hare, hyena, monkeys, squeals and wild dogs.

THE POTENTIALS OF “MKWAJU” TREE

Mkwaju is a large tree to 30 meters in diameter with an extensive dense crown. The short bole can be one meter in rough, grey; flaking and leaves is compound in hairy stalks to 15 cm, 10 to 18 pairs leaflets, dull green to 3 cm round the tips and base and veins raised.
Flowers; buds reds, petals gold with red veins inn small bunches. Its fruits are pale brown sausage like, hairy pods about 10 cm, cracking when mature to show sticky, brown pulp around 1 to 10 dark brown angular seeds. It is propagation is through seedling, wilding and direct sowing.

COMMUNITIES DEPEND ON MOUNTAIN RESOURCES

Tanzanian President nullifies application to grant Eastern Mountains as World Heritage Site
Tanzania's President has rejected an application to place some mountains in the Eastern Arc under the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) as a World Heritage Site.The President, Mr. Jakaya Kikwete, nullified an application that was submitted to UNESCO by Tanzania's Ministry of Tourism, which was looking for the UN body to assess and grant the Udzungwa and Uluguru mountain ranges in the Eastern Arc Mountains, the status of World Heritage Site.

EARTH DAY 2011: A LESSON TO TANZANIA

In recognition of the power of millions of individual actions, Earth Day 2011 organizes around a Billion Acts of Green; Personal, organizational and corporate pledges to live and act sustainably.

“A Billion Acts of Green”, is the theme chosen for Earth Day on 22 April, 2011 to inspire and reward both simple individual acts, organizational and governmental initiatives that further the goal of measurably reducing carbon emissions, supporting sustainability and to register one billion actions in advance of the Earth Summit in Rio in 2012.

BIRDS ARE THREATENED CREATURE IN CITIES.

More than 30 kinds of birds and their cry!!
More than 30 species of birds within Mbeya city but it keeps decreasing yearly. The species include Sunbirds, Pied crow, Hammerkop, Black Kite, Olive Pigeon, African Mourning Dove, Common bulbul, White Browned Robin Chat, Variable Sunbird, Black and White Mannin,Yellow White-Eye, Amethyst Sunbird, Eastern Double Collared Sunbird, Tawny-Flanked Prinnia, Schalows Turaco, Barn Swallow and many others. These are found in districts of Mbeya town, Mbeya rural, Chunya, Rungwe, Mbozi, Kyela Ileje and Mbalali.

URBANIZATION IN RANGES OF MOUNT MPOROTO

Ranges of mount Mporoto are located in Mbeya City-Tanzania. The mountain is covered by natural forest which is managed by the Government. In this forest there are different wild animals and one of them endemic specie known as KIPUNJE by its local name, and also at the top of this mountain there is a natural lake called lake IGOSI.

GLOBALLY THREATENED BIRD IN THE EASTERN ARC MOUNTAINS

THE LONG-BILLED TAILORBIRD Artisornis moreaui
The East Usambara Mountains are home to the critically endangered Long-billed Tailorbird Artisornis moreaui, one of the rarest birds in Tanzania. The specie has a global population restricted to the East Usambara Mountains in Tanzania and the Njesi plateau in northern Mozambique. It was discovered in the Amani Nature Reserve in 1930, though it is currently found in other parts of the East Usambara plateau.

COMMUNITY PARTICIPATORY MANAGEMENT: A STRONG STRATEGY IN NATURAL RESOURCES CONSERVATION

For the past years, Conservation of nature and environment in Tanzania was believed to be responsibility of the Government through the Ministry of Natural Resources and Tourism. More recently, International, National and local Non- Government Organizations for Natural Resource conservation such as World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF), African Wildlife Foundation (AWF), Frunkfut Zoological Society (FZS), Tanzania Forest Conservation Group (TFCG), Environmental Management and Economic Development Organization(EMEDO),Wildlife Conservation Society Tanzania (WCST) and many others have increasingly involved in conservational of natural resources.

MOTOR VEHICLES AND AIR POLLUTION IN DAR ES SALAAM CITY

You can go days without food and hours without water, but you won't last a few minutes without air. As human beings, on average we breath over 3,000 gallons of air per person each day. In addition to consuming up so much air in 24 hours over the course of 365 days humans manage to inhale precisely 1,095,000 gallons of air throughout the year. That’s a large amount of air that humans not only need but demand as means to survive in everyday life.

If you ask me, better it wouldn’t be to our benefits as human beings, if we live in a non polluted environment. The only possible logical answer to that question would have to be a sound and potent yes! But the so popular question still remains the same why should we be concerned about air pollution? It is only commonsense to figure out that you must have air to live.

THE IMPACT OF ENVIRONMENTAL BY LAWS ON LIVELIHOODS AT AYASANDA AND HARAA VILLAGES

Environmental conservation of natural resources practiced by villages of Ayasanda and Haraa is a result of the by laws developed by the village council. Ayasanda and Haraa are villages which conserve the environment under the community based forestry management system. These villages are located at 18 Km from Babati town to Kondoa.
Mrs Anna Belto Litemba Haraa chairperson committee said; “Ulinzi shirikishi wa msitu bila sheria hauwezi kufanikiwa”. She explained that the success on conserving the forest is through by laws. By laws establish Village Environmental Committee (VEC) at village level. The by-laws clear state the structure, functions, obligations, responsibilities, revenues, expenditures, objectives, and principles governing the committee.

WILD-ANIMAL POPULATION AT RISK!

An invasive weed threatens pasture land and the ecosystem of the Maasai Mara. The International Union of for conservation of Nature (ICUN) has issued an alert on the weed commonly known as Santa Maria feverfew.

The Serengeti-Maasai Mara ecosystem in Africa which host the largest wildlife migration known to man, is under attack from a noxious weed” the ICUN alert.
The Serengeti-Maasai Mara is home of African’s largest herbivore population. At the start of annual rainy season, millions of wildebeest, gazelles, zebras and giraffes leave the Tanzanian Savannah for pasture in the plains of Kenya. In December, the animals leave Kenya to Tanzania creating a tourist spectacle, all these at risk.

DID YOU KNOW TRADITIONAL MEANS OF CONTROL PEST AND DISEASES?

Long time ago our grant parents used many traditional methods to control pest and diseases. They used backs, leaves, roots and animals product such as dung and urine. These methods are friendly to environment. At that time there were no inorganic chemicals which were used to control pest and disease to their crop, so they thought other alternative way to reduce destruction of crops.

HAVE YOU EVER SEEN NATURE PRIVATE FOREST PARADISE !

Mzee Joachim John Tambo is an old man white hair walks with the help of a stick known as Mkongojo.His house decorated with a greenish plant like banana trees and some animals and birds such as Duck, Cows and Goats. Mzee Joachim lives in Halla village in Babati district and owns private forest. He is doing other activities such as tree nursery, taking care of tree fruits and hortculture.

SUCCESS OF PRIVATE INDIVIDUAL ON PARTICIPATORY FOREST MANAGEMENT

The Halla forest is owned by one Mr.Joachim Tambo an old man born on 1937, the forest is a Private Forest Reserve, it has a large area and enough space as well as many attractive things, like a variety of trees in the forest (natural and planted ones), water sources from the spring, monkeys and a garden area where there are many species such as pawpaw, mango, orange, coffee tree and vegetable such as trivelia.

DID YOU KNOW THE CONTRIBUTION OF COMMUNITY IN PROTECTION OF FOREST?

The involvement of the community in forest was new concept which was established by the government at the early 1990’s this aimed to replace the previous system where government used to own all forest reserve areas. At Ayasanda village in Babati, before the government return the forest to the community, there were open discussion on the crucial benefit that community might get upon decide to protect the forest. The community started to participate fully in securing forest from been degraded, few years later they started benefited from their effort.

According to chairman of Ayasanda village Mr. Kwentlema Khwantlay “forest declared to be under community based forest management in 4/10/1994”, every village around the forest were responsible to ensure the survival of the forest. There after they establish environmental committee, which effective started to implement by-laws as means to support the policy. Inoder to reduce forest destruction the following was agreed: some products such as firewood, grasses, medicine and wild fruit were allowed to be collected freely, some uses of forest products were allowed after having licence, examples poles, logs, and fire wood used in schools and institution. The last category was the restricted uses of some of the forest product such as removing of backs of the tree, making fire, timber and charcoal production. All those categories have played the vital roles in the protection of the forest.

THE CONTRIBUTION OF PRIVATE FOREST MANAGEMENT TO AN INDIVIDUAL’S DEVELOPMENT AT HALLA VILLAGE

Mr. Joachim Tambo was born in 1937 in southern part of Tanzania; He owns a private forest of about 500 hectares at Halla village in Babati District. He has managed to protect and conserve a forest and have individual development. Before, he lived a low life standard with insufficient income.

In 1985 he started planting trees which enabled him to preserve water sources. The water source has been used by Babati Water Supply (BAWASA) to distribute water to four villages such as Kashi and Galapo. The distributed water has enabled Mr Joachim and the four villages to practice garden activities, few of which are “sukuma wiki”, salad and cabbages gardens.

HALLA FOREST IN THE HANDS OF JOACHIM.

Mr. Joachim John Tambo was born 1937 in Gallapo village, Babati district, in Manyara region from Mbugwe tribe. He finished standard four basic education in Gallapo village then shifted to Halla village with his parents.
In Halla village he managed to conserve the forest area approximately 550 hectares sustainably and successfully through the tree planting programs he kept, hardworking and intrapersonal commitment in combating land degradations and deforestations.
Furthermore, the tree planted led to thick greenish forest which created more water channels, later they collect into one main stream which is vital and savior source of water to four adjacent villages. The villages include Gallapo, Kashi, Geidamala and Ngalogadida.

LACK OF TITLE DEED RETARDS THE DEVELOPMENT OF INDIVIDUAL ENTREPRENEURS IN BABATI DISTRICT

The denied access to title deed retards the economic development and environmental conservation of individual entrepreneurs since they can not access loan from the bank. The loan obtained would be used for agricultural activities like land preparation, buying seeds, pesticides and harvesting. The money can also be used for conservation of individual forests through planting more trees and security purpose.

Individual entrepreneurs complain a lot for the failure of the local government to process their title deeds in a timely manner. This is the case in Babati district specifically at Hala and Haraa villages.o not have title deeds for the land they own.

CHALLENGES IN COMBATING ENVIRONMENTAL CRIME AT HARRA VILLAGE, BABATI.

If at all you happen to enter the community based conserved forests, just 18 kilometers south of Babati town you will be amazed. There lies a 1000 hectare forest on a land which was bare, just ten years ago. Interestingly, the former existed indigenous Miombo type of trees has been restored.
Harra village environment committee chairperson, Anna Temba points out that the task of returning the damaged forest has never been simple. It needs a lot commitment to make it happen, keeping in mind forests are still a rare resource, competing with the growing population.