Tanzania: Salty Soils Drive Farmers Into Forest Reserve
SPREADING PROBLEM
The situation is likely to get worse. Officials from the state-run Rufiji Basin Development Authority (RUBADA) expect salt-water intrusion to damage more land in the valley.
“We have done many studies, and they have proved that this problem will certainly spread, threatening our food security,” explained its chief executive Aloyce Masanja.
More than 90 percent of households in the Rufiji Delta and its floodplain – which have a combined population of more than 150,000 – make their living from rice farming.
They supplement their income with fishing and extraction of wetland products, such as weeds for making baskets. But in the past decade, population growth and unsustainable resource use, including cutting down trees for fuel wood and charcoal, is putting these activities at risk too.
Villagers fear their dwindling rice yields, coupled with government disruption of their forest farming activities, will force many to depend on food handouts this season.
“We invested massively in rice, but because of salt water, our fields are turning red,” said Jummanne Mwalekwa, a farmer in Nyamisati. “We can barely see the salt content in the soil, yet there is nothing we can do but to vacate the fields … Now the government says we have invaded its forests. Where can we go?”
Since the furore over the evictions, the government has eased its law enforcement efforts – at least for the time being – and is allowing farmers in the mangrove forests to continue their activities while it collects more data on their environmental impact.
MMP director Zawadi Mbwambo is hopeful that preliminary studies for forest protection projects will continue after the dispute is sorted out – especially given that the Norwegian government has already injected around $5 million to support local efforts to tackle climate change.
Kizito Makoye is a journalist based in Dar es Salaam, Tanzania. This story is part of a series supported by the Climate and Development Knowledge Network.
Posted by admin
on Feb 11 2012. Filed under Environment.
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