The Mara Mobile Veterinary Unit in Kenya - May�2010

The Mara Mobile Veterinary Unit in Kenya - May�2010: "During the month of May, 2010, the Central Rift veterinary unit was greatly involved in laboratory analysis of wildlife serum and tissue samples meant for bovine tuberculosis disease surveillance and research on wildlife species of Maasai Mara. The samples were submitted to Sokoine University of Agriculture in Morogoro, Tanzania and were analyzed in a biosafety tuberculosis laboratory. The tests included the gamma interferon test (Bovigam�) and tissue culture for Mycobacterium bovis infection in animals."

Wildebeest spectacle starts

Daily Nation: - News |Wildebeest spectacle starts: "Hotels are full, the wildebeest have been sighted and the Maasai Mara Game Reserve and Serengeti National Park are all set for the biggest wildlife spectacle in the world.

In trail of new seventh wonder of the world
The early ones have already begun their movement — a breathtaking migration of two million wildebeest, zebras and antelopes northwards from Serengeti in Tanzania to the Maasai Mara in Kenya."

Farming extensively: A ‘third way’ for agriculture? � ILRI News

Farming extensively: A ‘third way’ for agriculture? � ILRI News: "'To do that, don't look at the agro-business model for the future. It's really old and its tired. It's high on capital, chemistry and machines. And it's never produced anything really good to eat. Look to farms that restore instead of deplete. Farms that farm extensively instead of just intensively. Farmers that are not just producers but are experts in relationships.'"

With all eyes on Africa, Canada looks the other way - The Globe and Mail

With all eyes on Africa, Canada looks the other way - The Globe and Mail: "Governments in India, China and Russia are among those rushing to knock on the continent's door, seeking an edge in future business. Canada isn't following suit, leaving experts wondering: Will it hurt Canada's interests?"

The East African: |Outcry in West over plan to build road through Serengeti

Outcry in West over plan to build road through Serengeti:
"The Tanzanian government’s plan to build a road linking Arusha and Musoma is being opposed by wildlife advocates in the United States and other developed countries who warn that the route will disrupt the wildebeest migration and thus badly damage Tanzania’s tourism-dependent economy."

Wildebeest graze in Serengeti National Park, far from the prying eyes of the Maasai Mara tourists. Environmentalist have protested plans to construct a road through the park. File Photo

Traditional Food Crops Provide Community Resilience in Face of Climate Change | Worldwatch Institute

Traditional Food Crops Provide Community Resilience in Face of Climate Change | Worldwatch Institute

"A recent study by researchers from Cornell and Rhodes universities and the Sebakwe Black Rhino Conservation Trust found that traditional food crops, such as mubovora (pumpkin) and ipwa (sweet reed), are an important source of community resilience in Zimbabwe-including resilience to climate change and economic turbulence."

Why Are Well-Managed African Parks Losing Wildlife?

Why Are Well-Managed African Parks Losing Wildlife?

Asian ivory trade poses danger to African elephant | Science News

Asian ivory trade poses danger to African elephant | Science News: "A surge in demand for ivory in Asia is fuelling an illicit trade in elephant tusks, especially from Africa. Over the past eight years, the price of ivory has gone up from about $100 per kilogram ($100 per 2.2 pounds) to $1,800, creating a lucrative black market."

Building the role of local government authorities towards the achievement of the human right to water in rural Tanzania. Alejandro Jim�nez. 2010; Natural Resources Forum - Wiley InterScience

Building the role of local government authorities towards the achievement of the human right to water in rural Tanzania. Alejandro Jim�nez. 2010; Natural Resources Forum - Wiley InterScience: "In recent decades, many changes have occurred in the approach to financing and operating water services in developing countries. The demand-responsive approach is now adopted in many countries in a context of donor-supported decentralization processes, which gives more responsibility to end users. However, the government's responsibility at different levels is enforced by the international recognition of the human right to water. This paper examines specific actions that build the role of local government authorities in this scenario. A collaboration between an international NGO and a rural district in Tanzania from 2006 to 2009 is used as an action research case study that is representative of local capacity-building needs in decentralized contexts and rural areas"

Kilimanjaro Culture And Wildlife | Article Buster

Kilimanjaro Culture And Wildlife | Article Buster: "The Kilimanjaro Region is located in Tanzania, in Northeastern Africa. This is just one of the 26 regions in Tanzania. It is bordered to the North and East by Kenya; and to the West by the Arusha Region. Correspondingly, it is bordered to the Southwest by the Manyara Region; and to the South by the Tanga Region. There are six districts in the Kilimanjaro region including Hai, Rombo, Moshi Urban, Moshi Rural, Mwanga, and Same."

Elephant expert Iain Douglas-Hamilton to receive animal conservation award

Elephant expert Iain Douglas-Hamilton to receive animal conservation award | This Dish Is Veg: "Save the Elephants founder Iain Douglas-Hamilton, Ph.D., who was recently featured in Animal Planet’s “Secret Life of Elephants,” has been named the 2010 recipient of the Indianapolis Prize, the world’s leading award for animal conservation.

“The plight of the African elephant is intensely personal to Iain. He has studied, named and nurtured thousands of African elephants for generations, and it is this intimate understanding of and love for these magnificent mammals that drives Iain’s forceful efforts to secure a future for endangered African elephants,” said Michael Crowther, President/CEO, Indianapolis Zoo. “Iain truly epitomizes what it means to be a hero.”"

SAGCOT - Southern Agricultural Growth Corridor of Tanzania

SAGCOT - Southern Agricultural Growth Corridor of Tanzania: "The Southern Agricultural Growth Corridor of Tanzania (SAGCOT) is a public-private partnership which aims to boost agricultural productivity in Tanzania and the wider region. SAGCOT will promote “clusters” of profitable agricultural farming and services businesses, with major benefits for smallholder farmers and local communities. Read the concept note"

The stability of African savannas: insights from the indirect estimation of the parameters of a dynamic model

ESA Online Journals - The stability of African savannas: insights from the indirect estimation of the parameters of a dynamic model: "In this paper we indirectly parameterize a theoretical model of savanna dynamics with the aim of gaining insights as to how the grass–tree balance changes across a broad biogeographical gradient. We use data on the abundance of trees in African savannas and Markov chain Monte Carlo methods to estimate the model parameters. The analysis shows that grasses and trees can coexist over a broad range of rainfall regimes. Further, our results indicate that savannas may be regulated by either asymptotically stable dynamics (in the absence of fire) or by stable limit cycles (in the presence of fire). Rainfall does not influence which of these two classes of dynamics occurs."

Rhinos to be repatriated to Tanzania from SA

The East African: - 32 rhinos to be repatriated to Tanzania from SA: "A total of 32 rhinoceros will return to Tanzania from South Africa, in a project aimed at protecting the endangered animals. The project, expected to cost $7 million, will see 20 males and 12 females translocated in batches of six within a span of two years. Brian Harris, the managing director Singita Grumeti Fund — which is one of the organisations behind the project — said they will also enhance security and improve the animals’ viability and ecosystem in the Serengeti, Ngorongoro and Maasai Mara National Parks.

Mr Harris said Tanzania has only 70 rhinoceros left in its national parks with fewer than 700 remaining in the wild, while the total herd in Africa stands at just 4,200 from 60,000 rhinoceros in 1970."

Agent-based modeling in ecological economics

Scopus preview – Scopus - Annals of the New York Academy of Sciences: Agent-based modeling in ecological economics: "Interconnected social and environmental systems are the domain of ecological economics, and models can be used to explore feedbacks and adaptations inherent in these systems. Agent-based modeling (ABM) represents autonomous entities, each with dynamic behavior and heterogeneous characteristics. Agents interact with each other and their environment, resulting in emergent outcomes at the macroscale that can be used to quantitatively analyze complex systems. ABM is contributing to research questions in ecological economics in the areas of natural resource management and land-use change, urban systems modeling, market dynamics, changes in consumer attitudes, innovation, and diffusion of technology and management practices, commons dilemmas and self-governance, and psychological aspects to human decision making and behavior change. Frontiers for ABM research in ecological economics involve advancing the empirical calibration and validation of models through mixed methods, including surveys, interviews, participatory modeling, and, notably, experimental economics to test specific decision-making hypotheses. Linking ABM with other modeling techniques at the level of emergent properties will further advance efforts to understand dynamics of social-environmental systems."

Community attitudes toward wildlife and protected areas in Ethiopia

Scopus preview – Scopus - Society and Natural Resources: Community attitudes toward wildlife and protected areas in Ethiopia

Across Africa, national policies that established protected areas (PAs) typically limited local use of wildlife and other resources. Over time, these policies have raised tensions with rural communities and today threaten to undermine conservation goals. This article examines community-PA relationships at four important sites in Ethiopia-a country of rich tradition with an unusual colonial past. Using focus groups and household surveys, we found that despite local tensions, most respondents held positive views toward wildlife and nearby PAs. Factors influencing positive views included receiving PA benefits, good relations with PA staff, higher education levels, being older, having a large family, diversified income sources, owning fewer livestock, and fewer incidents of wildlife conflicts. In contrast, the devolved control of PAs from federal to regional levels has not influenced community-PA relations as intended. Our results suggest that relations could be improved through involving communities in co-management arrangements, honoring resource tenure and use rights, providing benefits, and implementing conservation education programs.

Payments for ecosystem services as a framework for community-based conservation in Northern Tanzania: Conservation practice and policy

Scopus preview – Scopus - Conservation Biology: Payments for ecosystem services as a framework for community-based conservation in Northern Tanzania: Conservation practice and policy

Payments for ecosystem services (PES) are an increasingly promoted approach to conservation. These approaches seek to develop financial mechanisms that create economic incentives for the maintenance of ecosystems and associated biodiversity by rewarding those who are responsible for provision of ecological services. There are, however, few cases in which such schemes have been used as a strategy for conserving wildlife in developing countries and very few operational examples of such schemes of any sort in sub-Saharan Africa. In savannah ecosystems, large mammal populations generally depend on seasonal use of extensive areas and are widely declining as a result of habitat loss, overexploitation, and policies that limit local benefits from wildlife. Community-based conservation strategies seek to create local incentives for conserving wildlife, but often have limited impact as a result of persistent institutional barriers that limit local rights and economic benefits. In northern Tanzania, a consortium of tourism operators is attempting to address these challenges through an agreement with a village that possesses part of a key wildlife dispersal area outside Tarangire National Park.

Responses to alternative rainfall regimes and antipoaching in a migratory system

Scopus preview – Scopus - Ecological Applications: Responses to alternative rainfall regimes and antipoaching in a migratory system: "We used HUMENTS, a spatially realistic socioecological model of the Greater Serengeti Ecosystem in East Africa, to explore the potential impacts of changing climate and poaching on the migratory wildebeest (Connochaetes taurinus) population, the fire regime, and habitat structure in the ecosystem, as well as changes in the size and economic activities of the human population outside the protected area. Unlike earlier models, the HUMENTS model predicted only moderate declines in the wildebeest population associated with an increasing human population over the next century, with a gradual expansion of agriculture, more poaching, and increases in fire frequency and reduced tree density. Changes in rainfall were predicted to have strong asymmetric effects on the size and economic activity of the human population and on livestock, and more moderate effects on wildlife and other ecological indicators. Conversely, antipoaching had a stronger effect on the ecological portion of the system because of its effect on wildebeest (and therefore on fire and habitat structure), and a weaker effect on the socioeconomic component, except in areas directly adjacent to the protected-area boundary, which were affected by crop-raiding and the availability of wildlife as a source of income."

Forage quality of savannas - Simultaneously mapping foliar protein and polyphenols for trees and grass using hyperspectral imagery

Scopus preview – Scopus - Remote Sensing of Environment: Forage quality of savannas - Simultaneously mapping foliar protein and polyphenols for trees and grass using hyperspectral imagery: "Savanna covers about two-thirds of Africa, with forage quantity and quality being important factors determining the distribution and density of wildlife and domestic stock. Testing hypotheses about the distribution of herbivores is hampered by the absence of reliable methods for measuring the variability of vegetation quality (e.g. biochemical composition) across the landscape. It is demonstrated that hyperspectral remote sensing fills this gap by revealing simultaneously the spatial variation of foliar nitrogen (crude protein) as well as the total amount of polyphenols, in grasses and trees. For the first time, the pattern of resources important for feeding preferences in herbivores (polyphenols and nitrogen) is mapped across an extensive landscape and the modeled foliar concentrations are shown to fit with ecological knowledge of the area. We explain how estimates of nitrogen (crude protein) and polyphenols may be scaled up from point-based observations to reveal their spatial pattern, and how the variation in forage quality can influence the management of savannas, including farms, communal grazing areas, and conservation areas"

Spatial avoidance of invading pastoral cattle by wild ungulates: insights from using point process statistics

Scopus preview – Scopus - Biodiversity and Conservation: Spatial avoidance of invading pastoral cattle by wild ungulates: insights from using point process statistics

Traditional rangelands in many developing countries are currently being encroached by cultivation, driving some herders to illegally use protected areas for grazing their cattle. Since cattle are an exotic species in these ecosystems, they might have an impact on the local wild herbivore communities, notably through competition. We used point pattern statistics to characterise the spatial relationships between wild ungulate species and cattle herds within a protected area in west Africa undergoing seasonal intrusions by cattle. We predicted that the wild ungulate species that are ecologically and morphologically similar to cattle, in terms of body mass and diet, would be more sensitive to grass depletion by cattle and would be separated from cattle to a larger extent. The spatial distribution of browsing and mixed-feeding antelopes did not seem to be affected much by cattle presence, whereas most grazing species showed spatial separation from cattle. Interestingly, elephants also showed significant separation from cattle herds.