Assessment of socio - economic and ecological values of halfmile strip buffer zone to the adjacent communities of Kilimanjaro National Park
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Date
2018
Authors
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Journal ISSN
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Publisher
Sokoine University of Agriculture
Abstract
In many developing countries people have viewed buffer zones as a way to accommodate
the needs of national parks and other categories of wildlife protected areas and in
sustaining livelihoods of the local communities living adjacent to these protected areas.
This study was done from September 2015 to April 2016 in eight villages adjacent to
Kilimanjaro National Park in order to assess the impacts of annexing Kilimanjaro Half
Mile Forest Strip (HMFS) to KINAPA. Household survey questionnaires, key informants
interview, focus groups discussion, field observations and secondary data from different
sources were used to collect information. The data were analyzed using SPSS computer
programme, Graph Pad InStat and descriptive statistics. The findings revealed that 64%
of respondents reported that they get firewood from their own home gardens and only
25% from HMFS. It was further observed that collection of fodder and firewood is
performed by women while beekeeping activities are undertaken by men. Further,
approximately 35% of respondents mentioned water to be the most significant ecological
value and the forest cover has declined from 47.14% to 12.14% the period between year
2001 to 2014. Nearly 63% of respondents revealed poor relationship with the park
management. Local community’s livelihoods were perceived to be affected by the new
management of HMFS, which denied them accessibility to forest products and water
services. Thus, from this study, annexation of HMFS had a positive impact to KINAPAs
ecosystem and negatively affected neighbouring local community socio-economically.
The study recommend communities to be allied with eco-tourism to minimize
dependence on natural resources only.
Description
M.Sc. Dissertation
Keywords
Socio - economic assessment, Ecological values, Halfmile strip buffer zone, Kilimanjaro National Park, Community livelihoods