Rangeland resources use and monitoring for sustainable development in Tanzania
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Date
2025
Authors
Journal Title
Journal ISSN
Volume Title
Publisher
Rangeland Society of Tanzania (RST)
Abstract
Tanzania rangelands covering nearly 50% of the total land mass
of 94 mill ha is endowed with a range of natural resources that
provide diverse goods and services. Rangelands provide a
number of ecosystem services including clean air, consumable
products such as red meat, milk, fiber, water and medicinal
plants. Also, they non-consumptive services such as recreation
and tourism
and acts as a carbon dioxide sink and thus
sustaining economic development of the country. The rangeland
water catchment areas of Tanzania provide water that generates
over 55 % of Tanzania’s hydropower. The livestock
sector employs about 50% of her population, equivalent to 4.6
million households. The travel and tourism compititiveness index
of 2021 by the World Economic Forum ranked Tanzania 1st in
Africa and 12th worldwide regarding the quality of its nature-
based tourism resources. As a result, tourism value chain
contributes nearly 17 % of the country GDP and is a third lagest
of direct employement sector with over 850,000 workers. Tourism
has been accounted for over one-quater of the country ‘s foreign
earnings in 2019, representing USD 2,605 mill. Production of red
meat from cattle, goat and sheep by 2023 stood at 544,983.8
metric tons and export was about 4,577.5 tons. Despite the
economic benefits of these rangeland resources to the country,
they are faced with a number of threats that undermine their
productivity, namely: agricultural expansion, deforestation,
wildfires, overgrazing and invasive alien species. These threats
emanate mainly from the lack of coherent approaches to planning
and decision making for sustainable utilization of the available rangeland resources. Haphazard development of water points
(dams, pans and boreholes) in wet season and/or dry season
grazing areas is an example of malpractice due to improper
planning as it attracts spontaneous sedentarization of pastoral
communities and year-round grazing that result in rangeland
degradation. Exploitation or rationing of rangeland resources to
uses or users has in most cases not been based on their
availability or condition (healthy) to satisfy needs. Reserved
rangeland areas for grazing and wildlife conservation lack
nationally organized range reources inventory and monitoring
because of the lack of enough employed well trained personel to
carry out this valuable task. Sustainable utilization of rangeland
resources entail uses that conserve soil, water, desirable plant
genetic resources, environmentally non-degrading, technically
appropriate, economically viable in terms of grazing animal
productivity, and socially acceptable. Thus, sustainable use of
rangeland resources requires access to reliable baseline
information. Data provided by rangeland resources inventory and
monitoring gives a variety of information, including; the
distribution, productivity and composition of natural vegetation;
rainfall and temperature regimes; edaphic and hydrological data,
grazing land utilization and wild and domesticated animals; land
tenure and ownership; and socio-economic information and
marketing. A thourough interpretation of such information can
lead to an informed decision and a guide to appoprate policy and
regulation in allocation and use of rangeland resources for
sustainable economic development. This paper elaborates the
importance of guided rangeland resources use through inventory
and monitoring for sustainable economic development in
Tanzania.
Description
Healthy Rangelands for Sustainable Economic Development PP. 35-46
Keywords
Sustainable utilization, Inventory-monitoring, Unguided resources use, Economic benefits