Conservation capacity declines after aid expiry in natural resources sector

By Nimi Mweta
3rd October 2010


A recent discovery of a 2m dollars worth of ivory contraband in a consignment at Hong Kong further embarrassed government authorities in the country, as Tanzania is steadily rising as the source of much or most of contraband ivory in the open market.

While the ink was still wet on some inquiry letter about laxity in this matter, President Jakaya Kikwete obtained BBC top slot news spot for nearly a whole day with the landmark decision on constructing a highway through the Serengeti. Relations are in disrepair.

The government has had serious difficulties making any substantial decisions in the natural resources sector, for instance taking disciplinary actions on lax control of poachers, and for that matter even in customs, in relation to the issue.

One area of conflict has led to plenty of noise outside actual newspaper headlines, namely the winding down of a Norwegian aid programme in the natural resources sector, with a lengthy paper sketched on the move. It complained that much of the cash was spent in allowances, etc.

That was precisely what has brought natural resources administration into an ‘olu-shambles’ sort of situation, where the staff is seething with anger over unmet packages that aid money had made it possible over the years.

Government staff are used to expecting payment for anything done outside the office, even if it was in a nearby village, and removing such expectations onerously affects their social standing and commitments.

It leads to a generalized go-slow about everything, for all the rank and file. It is partly conceivable that the measure by then Natural Resources Minister Prof. Jumanne Maghembe to hike hunting bloc fees by 500 per cent mid 2008 was intended partially to obtain the resources to cover the Norwegian aid cut gap, and square up with the staff.

The move backfired, as travel bookings collapsed as cancellations flowed by the week, and soon it was clear the minister’s position was untenable. He could not continue with that policy or change it and retain a brave face; a ‘mini-shuffle’ followed and he left.

In that sense the government is without means of paying natural resources staff the salaries and other allowances they expect, and aid agencies and missions have only some moral rebukes to make about the matter.

In the build up to the election period, Swedish envoy Halstrom intoned that Tanzania has to change its ‘allowances culture,’ and that means learning to live with the salary. In this idealistic outlook, the trouble with natural resources staff is that they are used to allowances; we all just need to forget it and everything will return to normal.

What is ‘returning to normal’ is indiscipline and informal hunting. Allowances are a means of partially raising living standards without a formal contract to that effect, thus soaking energies that would otherwise be used to seek for ‘change,’ as is now the case in the election campaign.

All change campaigns are rife with chances of instability, as failure leads to adopting other means, including rebellions or poll thefts as dominant classes fight with the bare knuckles ‘misguided’ popular expression.

But the seeds are all over, the gradual collapse of aid-dependent incomes policy. On top of this already disturbing situation comes another demand from the donor community, namely re-routing the Makuyuni-Musoma road by the southern and western sides of the Serengeti, along with Lake Manyara and for that matter the Ngorongoro Crater conservation area.

Maps show that it would take nearly twice the cost to build a road by that route instead of the ‘short cut’ through the Serengeti, and the government has to shoulder all the costs. It means overspending on Serengeti , denying others.

Were it that donor involvement in development aid is optimal, that added cost could be placed on a new project, financed say by a combination of donor agencies.

But with declining donor funds, it is expected that the government simply avoids building a highway through the zone, and everything else remains the same, or ‘equal.’

As it was in the case of unpaid or denied allowances, it is the machine of what is expected of government which does into the reverse; it organizes its own go slow, like wardens. So there is unavoidable diminishing of vigilance both on the wildlife front, as donors can’t purchase the stock of ivory and destroy it, and wish that the government take note of global prohibition of trade in ivory.

The idea is that when trade stops consumption will also be brought to an end, which is false, and in addition ivory is needed as medicine in the Far East, despite qualms and disbelief among western users not of natural products but of minerals and poisons as medicine.

Europe and America openly encourage treatment based on heroine-related materials but they won’t stand ivory-based treatments.

What is as yet unclear is what steps or measures the donors will seek to implement against Tanzania for a clear act of defiance, expressed either at expert level through articles availed to the ministry, like the recent write up in the journal, ‘Nature’.

What is unworkable is the donors’ abandonment of what looked like a participatory model, in preference to a ‘law and order’ model of natural resources engagement with the government. Just as in villages it is necessary for residents there to benefit from conservation in order to take it up, so must the government benefit, but donors prefer to remind it of CITES articles, etc.

There are limits however as to how far donors can move in a negative direction, as evidently an accord like CITES is workable only if the members can adhere to it voluntarily, and now it is breaking on the seams.

The Serengeti stand off is a particularly severe test as it adds another reason for silent boycott of Tanzania’s attractions when lobbyists in the West organize civic action against defaulters of accords on the conservation of nature.

It could affect message effectiveness of our advertising for tourists, and if that occurred, Selous Game Reserve would soon be opened for vast biofuel farms, to decimate jumbos.

SOURCE: GUARDIAN ON SUNDAY