Drought kills thousands of Cattle in Northern Tanzania.

By pmlay Submitted on 27 October, 2009 - 05:50

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Tanzania recently lost between 3,000 and 4,000 cattle worth 1 billion in a decade’s worst drought, Deputy Permanent Secretary for Livestock Development and Fisheries Ministry Jonas Melewas has said. Most cattle died in the north of the country – the northern highlands – he told the media in Arusha this week.

Ngorongoro, Longido and Monduli Districts in Arusha are the hardest hit. “With livestock dying and water being scarce, pastoral way of life has been reduced to struggle for survival.

Now the government has announced to build several modern abattoirs as part of a plan to buy animals from herdsmen

The ravages of the drought are clear in areas around Lake Natron and Oldonyo Lengai, reduced to desolate stretches of bare land. “This is the worst drought in ten years,” said Ngorongoro herdsman Lazaro Saitoti.

“The weather is all wrong, he says: "Rain falls when it should not, and does not come when it should,” said Naini ole Sirya, a pastoralist woman from Engikaret Village, Longido District.

The old woman said: “In 1980s and 1990s we used to get heavy and reliable rainfall. We had three rainy seasons but today it is only one season, which is also unpredictable.”

Naini said they face acute shortage of water for humans and cattle.

Another villager, Saipi Kimesera said: “I had 600 heads of cattle in 1989, today I am left with only 30, the rest having mostly died.

The villagers are no longer noticing dew that in the past used to be common during the early hours of the day. Elderly Koto Laizer lives near Namanga Town. According to her, that dew was very favourable to cows, but of late it has disappeared.

The impact of climate change seems to be worst on the lives of pastoralist people, like the Maasai and Barbaig as well as the Hadzabe and Akiye, who are hunters and gatherers respectively.

The indigenous people depend on the land and its natural resource base.

As it stands now, the majority of pastoralists’ families do not have enough animals to support the households. The catastrophe has also prompted conflicts between pastoralists and other landowners, such as farmers and investors.

Lifuraha Laltaika, Lecturer in Environmental law at Makumira University College, Arusha, cited the on going land dispute in Loliondo as being a result of climate change:

Laltaika is also the elected representative of Indigenous peoples of Africa in the Policy Board of the UN-REDD--(a Collaborative Programme of the United Nations agencies aimed at Reducing Emissions from Deforestation and Forest Degradation in developed countries). Another major challenge facing indigenous peoples as a result of climate change, he says, is lack of medicine because herbs are no longer readily available.

Laltaika who attended the just ended climate change negotiations in Bangkok, Thailand said, indigenous peoples globally are disproportionately affected by the impacts of climate change due to fragile and harsh ecosystems.

However, he is optimistic that governments will take this fact into account when deliberating on an international agreement to curb Carbon emissions during the 15th Conference of Parties to the United Nations

Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) to be held in Copenhagen-Denmark in December 2009. In the international negotiations, Indigenous Peoples are lobbying for

inclusion of the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples (UNDRIP). They also envisage reference to 'Free, Prior and Informed Consent (FPIC)'.

“In brief this means that indigenous peoples must have free access to information on all projects planned on their land as well as the impact they have on their living conditions” he noted.

Laltaika is concerned that developing countries such as Tanzania should stand firm in the negotiations and ensure that developed countries commit themselves to reduce emissions by at least 40 percent in the next 25 years compared to the 1990s baseline levels.