A GERMAN Development Agency (GIZ) project in the Ruvuma landscape where it allocated funds for building smelly fencing with help from village game scouts (VGS) in camps for four months to ensure safety of farmers' crops is paying dividends.

In the project sponsored by the parent ministry initialled as BMZ, the agency works with the Natural Resources and Tourism ministry within Liwale District, Lindi Region as well as Tunduru and Namtumbo districts in Ruvuma Region.

Issa Ndomondo, the Namtumbo District game warden, said they have been advising villagers to use all the methods drawn up by experts like scaring away wild animals, methods that are now becoming familiar, but not too effective.

“The challenge was more serious before GIZ came to our district.” he said, noting that people are grateful that elephant intrusion incidents have been reduced in most villages.

Only three out of eight villages involved in the mitigation of human-wildlife conflict project reported elephant crop raiding incidents during the past farming season, he said, pointing out that in Namtumbo District, GIZ works in eight villages.

These are Nelawamwahi, Ligunga, Kilimasera, Mtonya, Likuyu Sekamaganga, Likuyu Mandela, Nambecha and Kitanda, with the project being implemented for three years, mid-2022 to June 2025.

Chrian Zimbaiya, the GIZ technical advisor in the district, told members of the Journalists Environmental Association of Tanzania (JET) that this interventions has contributed to reducing human-wildlife conflicts (HWC) in Mtelawamwahi, Ligunga, Kilimasera, Mtonya and Kitanda villages.

“HWC challenges have decreased in five villages involved in the project. Only three villages still faced the problem,” he said, asserting that it GIZ hadn’t initiated the measure, crop damage in the villages, especially in Likuyu Sekamaganga, would have been much more serious.

He said taking into consideration that the budget allocated to reducing HWC by the district is limited, hence decisions by GIZ to provide a 120m/- subsidy to help with fuel, uniforms, allowances and tents.

Noting that the funding is intended for one year, he stated that the government would later need to take full responsibility to address the challenge, with Kitanda village chairman Joseph Ngonyani affirming that the project made a difference.

With support from GIZ the wildlife authorities have succeeded to reduce intrusion incidents from 46 in 2023 to 15 this year. The success is linked with instructions to the villagers on how to scare away the beasts, as well as the provision of protective equipment handed as part of the project.

The village government has been working with these agencies to stem elephant intrusions into farms and causing damage, he said, pointing at a smelly repellent as having worked wonders.

It is a handy method to mitigate the growing problem of crop-raiding by elephants, he said, noting that the few people still experiencing the challenge are those whose farms were not protected by using the smelly repellent fence.

Edson Ndungule, the Kitanda village executive officer, said that GIZ is also providing training to village wildlife officers to enhance their skills in dealing with the big animals. 

He appealed for more VGS as well as providing them with allowances to boost their morale, while a farmer, Afuna Nyoni from Kitanda village said she has harvested more maize this year compared to last.

She had farmed two acres in the 2023 farming season but elephants entered her farm and destroyed one and a half acres, she stated at the event.