The case of coastal management in Tanzania

Summary: Tanzania is attempting to manage the development of coastal areas through an Integrated Coastal Management Strategy (ICM).

Development cooperation experts hail this as a great step forward, but also warn against potential conflicts. It will take time until all stakeholders perceive the value of planned development.

Tanzania's coastal areas are home to a quarter of its population.

Most of theses 8 million people are very poor, yet the coastal regions are home to 75 percent of the country's industries.

Industrial and domestic pollutions problems thus are rampant.



New Strategy Targets Tanzania’s Coastal Problems

The government of Tanzania has joined other Indian Ocean countries to launch a National Integrated Coastal Management Strategy (ICM) that will strive to improve the living standard of the coastal people and revamp national development.

The strategy is a joint initiative between the Tanzanian National Environmental Management Council, the University of Rhode Island Coastal Resource Center, and the United States Agency for International Development (USAID). It was developed following years of community consultation and input.

Coastal erosion, as well as industrial and domestic based pollution in Tanzania coastal urban centers are viewed as critical threats to sustainable development.

According to the ICM strategy team leader Jeremiah Daffa, more than US$13.4 million have been injected into the project since 2000 from the American government through its aid agency USAID.

Daffa says the strategy is intended to improving the environment, as well as the well being and livelihood of all people who utilize coastal resources. These, he says, include the poor coastal communities who are engaged in small scale agriculture, artisanal fisheries, mariculture, use of forests and mangroves, and small scale business.

It will also support local initiatives, decision making for intersectoral development, and harmonizing national interests with local needs.

Michael Korff, counsellor for the American Embassy to Tanzania, attended the strategy's launch in April 2003. He believes that every cent put into coastal conservation is an investment. But Korff cautioned the project managers to expect some resistance when they attempt to implement the strategy, since human beings are resistant to new things regardless of their importance.

"When coastal management was introduced in the U.S. in the 1970s, many people, especially the developers, were sceptical about this management option, thinking it was about stopping development," Korff said.


"But over time, they realized that coastal management was a way to make development more predictable, sustainable and equitable. Coastal activities became more coordinated and coherent as information and decision making was shared among stakeholders, and our country has benefited from this coordination," said Korff.

Joint activities with USAID's private sector program will assist local communities to implement new wildlife and coastal resource management regulations. This support will include business planning, natural resource management and public advocacy, among other skills, to enable local populations to manage and benefit from wildlife populations.
(Map: Expedia.com)




The Tanzania coastal area stretches for over 800 kilometers (500 miles) of coastline covering five administrative regions - the capital region of Dar es Salaam, Tanga to the north of the capital, Coast in the west, and in the south Lindi and Mtwara.

About two thirds of the coastline has fringing reefs, often close to the shoreline, broken by river outlets including Rufiji, Pangani, Ruvuma, Wami, Matandu and Ruvu rivers.

The continental shelf is 5.8 kilometers (3.6 miles) wide, except for the Zanzibar and Mafia channels where the continental shelf reaches a width of about 62 kilometers (38.5 miles).

The Exclusive Economic Zone (EEZ), which extends 200 nautical miles out from the Tanzanian shoreline, has an estimated area of 223,000 square kilometers (86,100 square miles).

The five coastal regions encompass about 15 percent of the country’s land area and are home to approximately 25 percent of country’s population. This is about eight million people.

Most rural communities of the coast are very poor, earning less than US$100 per capita.

Yet the area contributes about one-third of Tanzania's Gross Domestic Product. Currently, 75 percent of the country’s industries are in urban coastal areas.