Market Commerce as Wildlife Protector? Commercial Initiatives in Community Conservation in Tanzania’s Northern Rangelands

Natural resource tenure, land management and wildlife conservation in Tanzania have attracted increasing attention since democratisation, liberalisation of the economy and the introduction of structural adjustment programmes. The three areas that have received greatest scrutiny are: i) land law and policy; ii) the role of local governments vis-à-vis decentralisation; and iii) the character of popular participation. There is, however, a gap in management and conservation objectives in the context of current laws and policies and contemporary political and economic realities. ~This paper focuses on community conservation in multiple land-use rangelands in northern Tanzania where wildlife, agriculture, pastoralism, tourism and other economic activities interact and compete over increasingly scarce resources.