Masters Dissertations

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Browsing Masters Dissertations by Author "Abukari, Haruna"

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    Comparing management strategies and park-adjacent community attitudes in mole national park in Ghana and Tarangire national park in Tanzania,
    (University of Dar es Salaam, 2018) Abukari, Haruna
    The success of biodiversity conservation in African countries depends to a large extent on the cooperation of local communities. This study specifically compared: the management strategies of the Mole and Tarangire National Parks; the general conservation-attitudes; the attitudes towards poaching; and the willingness to diversify livelihood activities of residents in communities near the two parks. The purpose of the study was to find out if the predominantly agricultural-communities around the Mole National Park (MNP) in Ghana would differ from the predominantly pastoral-communities around the Tarangire National Park (TNP) in Tanzania in terms of their attitudes towards the parks. The study surveyed 365 households in 3 villages adjacent to the TNP and 4 villages adjacent to the MNP. Elicitation studies in the form of focus group discussions were held prior to the household surveys to identify salient issues between the two parks and their neighboring communities. Regional and district natural resources officials as well as park staff also served as key informants to provide information for the assessment of management activities in the two parks. The household survey data was analyzed using IBM SPSS version 20. According to the assessments made by key informants, management of the two parks were both effective but the TNP scored higher than the MNP due to low investment in the latter. There was significant difference (at the 0.05 critical alpha level) between the conservation-attitudes and poaching-attitudes of residents in communities near the MNP and their counterparts in communities near the TNP. However, respondents in both countries showed slightly positive attitudes towards the parks as ecological entities and slightly negative attitudes towards them as community development agents. Factors that had significant effects on the direction of attitudes include: knowledge of park rules, employment opportunities in the park, distance between village and park, household size, and ‘occupation’. The findings suggest that any efforts aimed at increasing local community support for any of the two national parks, should critically consider livelihoods diversification, population control and extensive conservation education in neighboring communities.