Wildlife Policy of Tanzania.

The Wildlife Policy of Tanzania is a national policy prepared with a vision to promote the conservation of biological diversity, administer, regulate and develop wildlife resources,involve all stakeholders in wildlife conservation and sustainable utilisation, as well as in fair and equitable sharing of benefits, promote sustainable utilisation of wildlife resources, raise the contribution of the wildlife sector in country’s Gross Domestic Product (GDP) from about 2% to 5%, contribute to poverty alleviation and improve tbiodihe quality of life of the people of Tanzania, and promote exchange of relevant information and expertise nationally, regionally and internationally.
To promote sustainable utilization of wildlife resources and integrate wildlife conservation with rural development, efforts will be focused on promoting the legal use of wildlife and its products; encouraging legal and sustainable trade in wildlife and its products; protecting biological diversity through the creation of a series of viable conservation areas which include a representative sample of all important habitats and viable populations of all species especially those that are threatened and endemic to Tanzania; ensuring that the wildlife authorities have sufficient capability to carry out their law enforcement functions, effectively cooperating with other law enforcement agencies, training and supporting village wildlife scouts; conserving and managing biological diversity through the rehabilitation of particular habitats, introduction and reintroduction of particular fauna species, retaining the ownership of, and overall responsibility for management of wildlife resources by the State, and developing management plans and zoning prescribing levels.
To reduce rural poverty strategies will focus on adopting measures that bring an equitable share of revenue from tourist hunting to the rural communities, on whose land the industry is practised, providing the necessary assistance in allocating concessions and setting wildlife utilisation quotas for the rural communities, permitting and regulating trade on wildlife and wildlife products, adopting a flexible approach to collecting revenue from harvests of biological natural products in Game Reserves, compelling licensed dealers to employ casual workers from areas where wildlife utilization activities are conducted, with the aim of generating local employment and income benefits, encouraging ranchers and farmers operating on privately owned or leased land to develop cropping programmes to supply designated markets with meat and trophies, encouraging the involvement of the private sector in supporting protection of wildlife and development of wildlife areas.
This policy also recognises the role of women and children in the conservation of natural resources and the need for them to participate and benefit from the conservation of the resources. To this end, the strategies will be focused on i) initiating and supporting women self-help projects in order to increase their income; (ii) encouraging women to work on natural resources conservation related projects which enhance the nutritional status and contribute to the family income; (iii) encouraging and supporting men and women to work on those projects which reduce women and children workload; (iv) supporting maternal care in villages surrounding PAs; (v) supporting and promoting efforts in providing education to children; (vi) enhance women access to natural resources products in PAs where appropriate; and (vii) promoting conservation awareness.
Regarding governance, since the Wildlife Sector of Tanzania has a number of institutions concerned with wildlife conservation, this policy recognises the responsibilities of these institutions in the implementation of the policy. However, the overall executive and overseeing responsibility for the wildlife sector, protected areas devoted to wildlife conservation and wildlife outside protected areas will be vested with the Directorate of Wildlife in the ministry responsible for the wildlife sector. In implementation of the Wildlife Policy, it interacts with other sectoral policies such as, tourism, agriculture, water, minerals and environment. This policy recognises the roles of other sectoral policies in its implementation.