Cross posted from Worldwatch Institute's Nourishing the Planet.

Earlier this week, we highlighted Nicholas Kristof's OP-ED in the New York Times about Gabon, a country in West-Central Africa where the rights of farmers are frequently in conflict with wildlife conservation efforts. One young village chief and farmer, Evelyn Kinga explained that she doesn't like elephants because they eat her cassava plants-a crop her livelihood depends on-because she doesn't benefit from rich foreigners who come to Gabon for eco-tourism.

But it doesn't have to be this way, says Raol du Toit, Director of the Rhino Conservation Trust in Zimbabwe. His organization works closely with farmers on the ground to help communities realize that protecting wildlife can be in their own best interest.

du Toit promotes "landscape-level planning" that takes into account the needs of wildlife, the environment, and farming communities. Rather than relying on development agencies and governments to decide where cattle fences should go or where farmers should plant their crops, local communities and stakeholders need to be part of the process. Development aid, says du Toit, should follow what local stakeholders need and perceive, not the other way around. Additionally, the Rhino Conservation Trust provides classroom materials for schools so that students may learn the connections between sustainable agriculture and wildlife conservation at an early age. (See also Helping Farmers Benefit Economically from Wildlife Conservation)

And du Toit is not alone in his effort to improve the lives of farmers, as well as protect wildlife.

In Tanzania, the Jane Goodall Instutite (JGI) started as a center to research and protect wild chimpanzee populations in what is now, thanks to their efforts, Gombe National Park. But by the early 1990's the organization realized that in order to be successful it would have to start addressing the needs of the communities surrounding the park. JGI was planting trees to rebuild the forest but members of the community were chopping them down-not because they wanted to damage the work but because they needed them for fuel and to make charcoal.

In response, JGI started working with communities to develop government- mandated land use plans, helping them develop soil erosion prevention practices, agroforestry, and production of value-added products, such as coffee and palm oil. "These are services," says Pancras Ngalason Executive Director of JGI Tanzania, "people require in order to appreciate the environment" and that will ultimately help not only protect the chimps and other wildlife, but also to build healthy and economically viable communities. (See also: Rebuilding Roots in Environmental Education)

In Botswana, the Mokolodi Wildlife Reserve is doing more than just teaching students and the community about conserving and protecting wildlife and the environment, they're also educating students about permaculture. By growing indigenous vegetables, recycling water for irrigation, and using organic fertilizers-including elephant dung-the Reserve's Education Center is demonstrating how to grow nutritious food with very little water or chemical inputs.

When school groups come to learn about the animals, the reserve also teaches them about sustainable agriculture. Using the garden as a classroom in which to teach students about composting, intercropping, water harvesting, and organic agriculture practices, the Wildlife Reserve helps draw the connection between the importance of environmentally sustainable agriculture practices and the conservation of elephants, giraffes, impala, and various other animals and birds living in the area.(See also: Cultivating an Interest in Agriculture Conservation)

To read more about innovative ways to protect agriculture and the surrounding wildlife, read: From Alligator to Zebra: Wild Animals Find Sanctuary in the Lilongwe Wildlife Centre, A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to Kigoma, Tanzania, Protecting Wildlife While Improving Food Security, Health, and Livelihoods, Helping Conserve Wildlife-and Agriculture-in Mozambique,  Honoring the Farmers that Nourish their Communities and the Planet, and Investing in Projects that Protect Both Agriculture and Wildlife

Thank you for reading! If you enjoy our diary every day we invite you to get involved:
1. Comment on our daily posts-we check comments everyday and look forward to a regular ongoing discussion with you.
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Cross posted from Border Jumpers, Danielle Nierenberg and Bernard Pollack.

A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to Kigoma, Tanzania

We arrived in Dar es Salaam, Tanzania excited to catch a flight to Kigoma, a region in the northwestern part of the country to visit a Jane Goodall Institute Tanzania project working with small farmers to promote sustainable agriculture. Unfortunately Precision Air, one of only two airlines that flies to the remote region, has suspended all flights for the next several weeks and the other airline is all booked.

No worries, we headed to Zanzibar instead....

Zanzibar is a place known for beautiful beaches, but the thing that I liked most about my visit there was the food. Everywhere you look there's a bounty of fresh vegetables, fruit, and, most importantly given the island's history, spices. Zanzibar is one of the "Spice Islands," a group of islands that supplied cloves, coriander, nutmeg, pepper, vanilla, and other spices to Europe in the 17th Century.  Today, those spices are grown much the same way they were then-organically, without the use of chemical pesticides and artificial fertilizers, in response to consumer demand. And they're still grown on large plantations, but instead of slaves planting and harvesting the crops, local Tanzanian farmers use intercropping to grow many of the spices along with fruit trees and vegetables. The spice farms are also benefiting from tourism-I paid a shockingly low $12 for my day long trip to the spice farm, which included a wonderful (and spicy!) vegetarian lunch and a trip to a pristine and deserted beach.

The Tanzanian government, however, controls much of the land where the spices are grown and also where they are sold. Vanilla grown in Zanzibar, for example, is not used on the island or even in mainland Tanzania, but is grown exclusively for export. And Zanzibar is also the world's third largest supplier of cloves, the main export from the island.

When we arrived back to Dar Es Salaam we did have the opportunity to meet with Pancras Ngalason who is the Executive Director of Jane Goodall Center (JGI) in Tanzania and he explained how the Institute has evolved since it began in the 1970s. They've gone, according to Ngalason, beyond research to address questions of livelihood.

JGI started as a center to research and protect wild chimpanzee populations in what is now, thanks to their efforts, Gombe National Park. But in the early 1990s JGI realized that if it didn't start addressing the needs of the communities surrounding the park, their efforts to conserve wildlife wouldn't work. JGI first started by planting trees in the region, but soon found that communities cut them down, not because they wanted to, but because they needed them for fuel and for making charcoal. It was at that time, says Ngalason, that we "thought beyond planting trees" and more about community-based conservation.

JGI started working with communities to develop government- mandated land use plans, helping them develop soil erosion prevention practices, agroforestry, and production of value-added products, such as coffee and palm oil. They like to say that their products are "Good for All"-good for farmers by providing income, good for the environment by protecting natural resources, and good for the consumer by providing a healthy product.

They're also working training community health practitioners about reproductive health and HIV/AIDS prevention, educating youth, establishing micro-credit programs, and working with UNICEF and USAID to supply clean water to communities.

We then hopped on a bus to Arusha, Tanzania to meet with the World Vegetable Center...

As hunger and drought spread across Africa , there's a huge focus on increasing yields of staple crops, such as maize, wheat, cassava, and rice. And while these crops are important for food security, providing much needed calories, they don't provide much protein, Vitamin A, Vitamin C, calcium, iron, riboflavin, thiamin, niacin, other important vitamins and micronutrients-or much taste. "None of the staple crops," says Dr. Abdou Tenkouano, the World Vegetable Center's Regional Director for Africa, "would be palatable without vegetables." And vegetables, he says, "are less risk prone" than staple crops that stay in the field for longer periods of time.

Because vegetables typically have a shorter growing time, they can maximize often scarce water supplies and soil nutrients better than crops such as maize which need a lot of water and fertilizer.

Unfortunately no country in Africa, according to Dr. Tenkouano, has a big focus on vegetable production. But that's where the Center steps in. Since the 1990s, the Center (which is a part of the Asian Vegetable Research and Development Center based in Taiwan) has been working in Africa to breed cultivars that best suit farmers' needs.

Despite the focus on staple crops, vegetable production generates more income on and off the farm than most other agricultural enterprises, according to the Center's website. And unlike staple crops, vegetable production is something that benefits urban and rural farmers alike (See our posts on urban farmers in Kibera slum in Nairobi, Kenya).

In addition, vegetable production is the most sustainable and affordable way of alleviating micronutrient deficiencies among the poor. Often referred to as "hidden hunger," micronutrient deficiencies-including lack of Vitamin A, iron, and iodine-affect some 1 billion people worldwide. They lead to poor mental and physical development, especially among children, and cause poor performance in work and in school, further crippling communities already facing poverty and other health problems.

But by listening to farmers and including them in breeding research, the Center is helping to alleviate these problems.

Introducing a new weekly series where we recommend one song, or compilation of songs, from a country in Africa, brought to you by our awesome friends at Awesome Tapes From Africa. Today's selection is from Zimbabwe.

There is a great diversity of music to be heard in Zimbabwe but one classic is John Chibadura and the Tembo Brothers. This music feels like nothing but good times.

Thank you for reading! If you enjoy our diary every day we invite you to get involved:
1. Comment on our daily posts -- we check for comments everyday and want to have a regular ongoing discussion with you.
2. Receive regular updates--Join the weekly BorderJumpers newsletter by clicking here.
3. Help keep our research going--If you know of any great projects or contacts in West Africa please connect us connect us by emailing, commenting or sending us a message on facebook.

Cross posted from www.BorderJumpers.org.

There's more...

This is the second in a two-part series about my visit to the Jane Goodall Institute (JGI) in Dar es Salaam, Tanzania.

After my initial disappointment of not being able to travel to Kigoma, Tanzania to visit the Jane Goodall Center's projects in Gombe National Park--thanks to mechanical problems on Precision Air --I decided that there was still a lot to learn about the Institute's work at the Dar headquarters. Nsaa-Iya Kihunrwa, the Director of JGI's Roots and Shoots program, explained further how the Institute's work has evolved over the last 15 years.

JGI first started working with school children in the early 1990s through Roots and Shoots, a program that trains students and teachers about conservation. They're striving, according to Mr. Kinhunrwa, "to create a generation of conscientious adults" who care about the environment.

Through Roots and Shoots, JGI has worked with the Tanzania Ministry of Education to train teachers to use environmental themes in their classrooms. When children are learning about fish and other foods, for example, teachers are now using experiential learning--taking kids to fish markets, for example--to identify breeds and varieties and talk about conservation. These new ways of learning help students make the connections between what they eat and the health of the planet.

These skills will help train the next generation of farmers, teachers, laborers, and businesspeople in Kigoma and elsewhere in Tanzania not only to be more aware of environmental issues, but to also become conservationists and help preserve wildlife and biodiversity in the area.

There's more...

We arrived at the Jane Goodall Institute (JGI) office in Dar Es Salaam, Tanzania, thrilled about our upcoming trip to Kigoma, a remote province on the Northwestern (check) of the country. JGI had arranged an eight day visit, allowing us to see firsthand their incredible work in several different parts of the province. Danielle would do all the serious research, and I would have a chance to play with chimps!

But when we arrived at our meeting: Pancras Ngalason, JGI Tanzania's Director, casually asked to us: "How are you getting to Kigoma?"

"We're flying...", we responded (the 27-hour bus ride on unpaved roads doesn't have a bathroom or show any American romantic comedies).

"Hope not with Precision Air?," he asks.

[Silence]

" Yes, why....," we respond...

It turns out that Precision air is the worst airline in the world (in case anyone was wondering).

Why? Well, for starters... the government is recalling one of their planes for safety and maintenance (already a bad sign - when the Tanzanian government recalls a plane, it's probably pretty serious). And of course this was the only plane that Precision routed between Dar Es Sa Salaam and Kigoma - and due to these safety concerns, the entire route is suspended for nearly four weeks - until mid-December (they have dozens of planes - none that they can "spare" to pick up any flights on this route)...

When Bernie first heard the news he wondered, of course, if it was due to a worker strike and would have joined the picket line for better wages. But instead the government was punishing the airline for being unsafe! Welcome to traveling in Africa.

Did Precision Air contact us by email and let us know that our flight was canceled before we traveled all the way to Dar? No. No email, no notification to our travel agent, no newspaper advertisement, no press release, no Facebook message, not even a Tweet, nothing...

And the only other airlines that flies there - Air Tanzania - has no reciprocity agreement that allowing Precision to rebook us automatically. And Air Tanzania's route is completely full for the net two weeks. But, we thought, it should be easy to get a refund...

Not quite. After going to the Precision Air office and speaking to an agent we were told to come at in a few hours when the cashier would be back and could refund us. When we returned, no cashier. Come back before closing they said. We did. But instead of a refund, we had to get in shouting match with the office manager. You might not know it by looking at her, but Danielle is not someone you want to cross. She looks quiet and cute - but when she's mad, she's really mad. After listening to the manager tell us that there was nothing he could do to help us, Danielle stood up and proceeded to tell the manager why in no uncertain terms he better make a long distance phone call to our travel agency and get this straightened out--NOW. He made the call and arranged for us to be reimbursed--but they claim that the refund will take five or six months via mail to the United States.

So, just in case your planning your honeymoon in Zanzibar, hiking Mt. Kilimanjaro, or going on Safari anywhere in Tanzania - please, please avoid Precision Air.  

There's more...