Creating Wildlife Management Areas

Conservation efforts did not end at the reserve's boundaries. For the integration of local communities and the establishment of support-zones outside the reserve a specific Tanzanian concept was successfully developed and applied. Community based natural resources management and in particular village Wildlife Management Areas (WMA) are the major components. In a participative process of land-use planning local communities designate areas in which they conserve and manage wildlife and other natural resources. Revenues accrue to them. Thus WMA contribute not only to conservation but equally important to development and poverty alleviation in the rural areas. WMA are a core element of the 'Wildlife Policy' of Tanzania (1998).

Deutsche Gesellschaft für Technische Zusammenarbeit (GTZ) supported the Wildlife Division in the establishment of WMA south of the Selous Game Reserve until 2005. There, in cooperation with local and district authorities, villages are about to register two Wildlife Management Areas, the “Mbarangandu” and “Nalika” WMAs, with a total area of approximately 4,500 km2.