The influence of community-defined land use plans and de facto land use practices on the relative abundance and distribution of large wild mammals in a community-based Wildlife Management Area in southern Tanzania

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dc.contributor.advisorKilleen, Gerry
dc.contributor.advisorButler, Fidelma
dc.contributor.advisorexternalMombo, Felister
dc.contributor.authorDuggan, Lilyen
dc.contributor.funderAXA Research Fund
dc.date.accessioned2024-05-28T11:52:58Z
dc.date.available2024-05-28T11:52:58Z
dc.date.issued2023
dc.date.submitted2023
dc.description.abstractThis study investigates the relationship between community-defined land use plans and de facto land use practices, and the influence of the latter on the relative abundance and distribution of large wild mammals in a community-based Wildlife Management Area (WMA) adjacent to Nyerere National Park (NNP) in southern Tanzania. The WMA model represents a relatively new approach to community-based conservation in Tanzania, in which local villages set aside part of their land for wildlife conservation and manage that resource collectively, so that their stakeholder communities can leverage economic and social benefits from income-generating activities like tourism. The Ifakara-Lupiro-Mangula (ILUMA) WMA acts as a key buffer zone between the fully domesticated habitats of the villages to the north and west, and Nyerere National Park to the east. All observed signs of wildlife and human activity were recorded across 32 locations inside ILUMA and in the permanent settlements and national park that border it to the west and east, respectively. For the great majority of wild mammal species, surveys around water bodies within a 2km radius of suitable camping locations proved more sensitive than those along transects between them. The latter transect surveys were only more sensitive for Sable and Spotted Hyena, which are known to routinely commute considerable distances across their home ranges, and for Greater Kudu that seldom drink surface water. Across much of ILUMA WMA, in areas where agreed land use plans were not adhered to, rampant cattle herding and land clearing for cultivation of rice and other tillage crops were associated with reductions in wildlife richness and biodiversity, as well as overall ecosystem integrity. Many unauthorised human activities were recorded inside ILUMA, such as livestock herding, charcoal burning and agriculture, and, where they occur at a high density, wildlife populations are negatively affected. Although all these activities impact wildlife to some degree, cattle herding had the most severe negative effect on wildlife (Species Richness, P=0.002, Simpson’s Index of Diversity, P=0.0022) and ecosystem integrity (P <<0.0001). Nevertheless, several well-managed authorised human settlements within the WMA, where fishing is the primary authorised livelihood, support thriving wildlife populations and pristine land cover, so human settlement per se was not found to be associated with reductions of any of these composite indices (P≥0.4532), except for the novel subjective natural ecosystem integrity index (P=0.0256). Correspondingly, the best conserved parts of the WMA were those closest to the national park to the east and the fishing villages to the north, where compliance with agreed land use plans is highest. Overall, this study illustrates how well-managed WMAs can host resident local communities undertaking selective and appropriately regulated natural resource extraction activities, while maintaining a rich and diverse local wildlife population and acting as an effective buffer zone between fully domesticated areas of human habitation and pristine environments such as national parks. Furthermore, this study also developed and evaluated a novel method for synthesizing consensus subjective impressions of the investigators and intuitively expressing them in semi-quantitative format as a readily interpreted subjective natural ecosystem integrity index that accounts for all aspects of land use, wildlife and human activities. Crucially, however, this alternative to statistical syntheses of extensive, formally collected survey data is intuitively accessible to all manner of stakeholders, including relevant communities, and should be far better suited to routine programmatic monitoring through participatory approaches.en
dc.description.statusNot peer revieweden
dc.description.versionAccepted Versionen
dc.format.mimetypeapplication/pdfen
dc.identifier.citationDuggan, L. 2023. The influence of community-defined land use plans and de facto land use practices on the relative abundance and distribution of large wild mammals in a community-based Wildlife Management Area in southern Tanzania. MSc Thesis, University College Cork.
dc.identifier.endpage189
dc.identifier.urihttps://hdl.handle.net/10468/15928
dc.language.isoenen
dc.publisherUniversity College Corken
dc.rights© 2023, Lily Duggan.
dc.rights.urihttps://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/
dc.subjectLand use plans
dc.subjectCommunity based conservation
dc.subjectWildlife Management Area
dc.subjectLarge mammal survey
dc.titleThe influence of community-defined land use plans and de facto land use practices on the relative abundance and distribution of large wild mammals in a community-based Wildlife Management Area in southern Tanzania
dc.typeMasters thesis (Research)en
dc.type.qualificationlevelMastersen
dc.type.qualificationnameMSc - Master of Scienceen
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