The politics of environment in Tanzania: the case of the pastoral peasants of Shinyanga

This study has tried to identify and analyse various factors which contribute in accelerating the environmental crisis in Shinyanga. The underlying assumption however is that various motives have been sought under the cover of the crisis of environment in Shinyanga. This tendency as a result has focused on reduction of livestock as a major solution to the crisis leaving aside important contributing factors such as cotton production. Our suggestion is that this approach is not correct and if it is not abandoned the environmental problem in Shinyanga will continue to persist. It is further suggested that the crisis of environment in Shinyanga and the marginalisation of the pastoral peasants in this region cannot be understood in isolation from the general global environmental crisis. The Shinyanga case is one of the various manifestation of the nature and character of the ecological crisis in the peripheries of the international capitalist system. The fact that the crisis persists is clear evidence that as world capitalism want to enhance the integration of the rural peasants i.e. pastoral peasants into its domain more problems of different dimension will be felt in the poor countries. This is because; the integration process is achievable only at the expense of both the environment and the well being of the rural poor. People on their own have tried to search for alternative ways to face the challenges created by the integration process. It is important for the state in Tanzania to support such initiatives. It will be of significant importance however for the state to re-conceptualize its development strategies if at all the crisis of environment in Shinyanga has to be solved. This should entail a systematic and progressive abandonment of cotton production as a first step.