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Contents

eyeball Country profile
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eyeball Biological significance
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eyeball Conservation threats
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eyeball WWF involvement
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eyeball Achievements
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eyeball Scholarships
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eyeball Udzungwa mountains National Park
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eyeball Environmental education - TEEP
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eyeball Ruaha National Park
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eyeball Conservation of lowland coastal forests
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eyeball Mafia island marine park blue line
header: Tanzania


CONSERVATION THREATS

Rufiji River Tanzania is one of the 25 poorest countries in the world, and many of its conservation threats arise from its economic difficulties. Poaching, deforestation, overgrazing and overfishing are all common ways in which renewable natural resources are destroyed.

The rate of human population growth is one the fastest in Africa, with an estimated doubling time of only 19 years. Consequently, human and agricultural encroachment will have an enormous impact on conservation efforts.

There are also serious problems developing in the areas of soil erosion and degradation and decreased soil fertility. Deforestation in the Eastern Arc Mountains, where 30 per cent of Tanzania's endemic plant species are found, is of particular concern.

But it is the depletion of Tanzania's elephant and rhino population that is perhaps the most dramatic threat to conservation today. During the 1980s, the Government's inadequate funding of the national parks' protection services led to rampant poaching. The result was an 80 per cent reduction in the elephant population, which fell to 53,000 individuals, while the number of black rhino is currently unknown, but could be less than 100.