Tanzania

Tanzania's 33.5 million hectares (129,310 square miles) of forests are increasingly at risk, mostly as a result of illegal logging, which is destroying some 500,000 hectares (19,300 square miles) of the country's pristine forests every year.

The preservationist approach to forest protection tends to consider people as a threat to nature protection and frequently results in the violation of the human rights of rural communities and indigenous peoples living in the forests. This view not only supports the unrealistic idea of a nature void of people, but also ignores the benefits that the traditional management of natural resources brings to nature conservation itself. Over the last few years, conflicts related to this issue have arisen in several places and the following case is yet another sad result of such approach.

The Rufiji Delta in South Eastern Tanzania is one of the largest blocks of mangrove forests in East and Southern Africa. It covers an area of about 53,255 hectares of unspoiled mangrove forest, that support a large number of people, and is rich in aquatic as well as terrestrial biodiversity. The delta is linked to the interior of the river system by an extensive flood plain covering about 130 km long and up to 20 km wide.