Southern Tanzania Elephants Program

Shabiby Line left Dar at 6:30am on our way to Dodoma. We arrived at 4:30. I have not been in Dodoma in more than 10 years. I had only one night layover in Dodoma.

On the next day, I woke up super early to catch up the first bus to Manyoni and from there I took another bus to Itigi where I will be working for the next 3 days. I was here on a assignment to document Tembo Cup football tournament and the community that lives around the Rungwa-Kizigo-Muhesi Ecosystem.

Working with STEP for the past few days have completely changed my perspective on Tanzanian wild animals and especially, the Queen of the Savannah, the Elephant.

Elephants are a species of conservation priority in Tanzania, recognized for their contribution to the national economy through wildlife tourism, and threatened by an ivory poaching crisis that has reduced the country’s elephant population from 109,000 in 2009 to an estimated 50,000 individuals in 2015. However, elephants can also have negative impacts on people and livelihoods, especially in communities that share space and resources with elephants.

Thus, ensuring long-term human-elephant coexistence in Tanzania requires mitigation of the negative impacts of elephants on people, and vice versa.

STEP’s Human-Elephant Coexistence team works towards enhancing capacity for coexistence in the following ways:

-Working with farmers to form co-operatives and support crop damage reduction projects, including seven beehive fence projects in the Kilombero Valley.

-Trialing farm-based crop protection techniques such as smelly repellent and solar lights.

-Diversifying livelihoods and providing access to loans through Village Savings and Loans Associations.

-Conducting education and awareness-raising events to explain elephant behaviour, provide context for human-elephant interactions and provide advice on how to stay safe around elephants.

-Working with Village Governments to understand the drivers of human-elephant conflict and work towards establishing Land Use Plans that facilitate human-elephant coexistence.

-Supporting establishment of corridors to facilitate safe elephant movement (Source: Southern Tanzania Elephants Program)

Inauguration of Tembo Cup

Snake Boys Team

Itagata Team

Match between Snake Boys vs Itagata village

Spectetors at Tembo Cup

Lulanga Primary School students listening intently to a presentation from STEP at the Tembo Cup Festival in Lulanga village, Itigi district, Singida region.

Various magazines and books, as well as films and Tembo Cup competitions including one of the ways STEP uses to educate the community on human-wildlife coexisting in villages that have grown alongside wildlife sanctuaries and in wildlife corridors.

Lulanga Primary School students

Presentation by Keffa from STEP

Lulanga Primary School students

Lulanga Primary Schhol students reading on info magazine provided by STEP

Portraits of Lugendo

A few hours earlier while we were watching a football game between Snake Boys versus the local village team Itangata, I saw his brother Emmanuel passing by with 2 cows heading home then he later came to watch the football game with his peer kids. His striking appearance made me turn my head and stare, he wore a headband tied on the other side with really big boots suggesting he'd go far into the wild. He later told me that he's only visiting this village cuz some of his cows are sick but he lives in the other village with his whole clan.

Together they went to the distant lands with a couple of cows of a hundred. They would survive of off milk, ugali na dagaa and some animal fat sometimes for a at least two months. They called it camping. As soon as I heard those stories he told me while we sat down and watched a movie about animal coexistince with farmers and herders, I immediately thought this is program is exactly aiming at herders like Lugendo and his brother from Mwamatiga village.

Lugendo told me that he really likes football and the movie we were watching. I could see him shaking his head and nodding his to what the narrator was saying. From the stories he told me about his close encounters with wild animals, fending off lions with a spear trying to eat his livestock while living amongst the giants of the wild, I knew he understood exactly what the narrator was saying because he lived through those experiences.

Lugendo told me that he doesn't get to watch movies like these or football matches because he's in the wild most of the time. He proceeded and asked if he could go watch the final match of Tembo Cup to be held at Itigi, Doroto village with our ride which was leaving early the next morning.

''No matter what we do, wild animals are apart of our land, part of our life'' Lugendo told me

Movie Screening in Lulanga Village

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