Page 294 - Environment: The Science Behind the Stories

CENTRAL CASE STUDYCENTRAL CASE STUDY

Will We Slice through

the Serengeti?

Lake KENYA
Victoria “Construction of the road will be a huge relief for
us. We will sell . . . maize and horticultural prod-
ucts to our colleagues in Arusha and they will bring
us cows and goats.”
— Bizare Mzazi, a small farmer outside Serengeti National
AFRICA Serengeti Indian Park
KENYA National Park Ocean
“If we construct this road, all our rhinos will disap-
TANZANIA pear. . . . We should strive to conserve our heritage
for future generations.”

TANZANIA — Sirili Akko, executive officer of the Tanzania
Association of Tour Operators

It’s been called the greatest wildlife spectacle on Earth. Each region is one of the last places on the planet where an ecosys-
year over 2 million wildebeest, zebras, and antelope migrate tem remains nearly intact and functional over a vast area.
across the vast plains of the Serengeti in East Africa. After Today 2 million people visit Tanzania and Kenya each year,
bearing their calves in the wet season, the wildebeest journey most of them ecotourists who visit the parks and protected
north to find fresh grass, in herds that can stretch as far as the areas. Serengeti National Park alone receives 800,000 visitors
eye can see. Packs of lions track the procession and pick off each year. Tourism pumps close to $3 billion into these nations’
the weak and the unwary. The wildebeest ford rivers where economies and creates jobs for tens of thousands of local
hungry crocodiles wait in ambush. The great herds spend the people. As such, the parks have become mainstays of these
dry season at the northern end of the Serengeti, and then they national economies.
turn back southward to complete their cyclical annual journey. Because the region’s people see that functional ecosys-
This epic migration, with its dramatic interplay between tems full of wildlife bring foreign dollars into their communities,
predators and prey, has inspired countless TV documenta- many are supportive of the parks. Indeed, East Africa has been
ries, and it has cycled on unbroken for millennia. Yet today, at the forefront of community-based conservation (p. 320), in
many scientists and conservationists are worried that the entire which local people steward their own resources, often in col-
phenomenon is threatened. They are alarmed by a proposal laboration with international conservationists.
to build a commercial highway across the Serengeti, slicing However, most people living in northern Tanzania remain
straight across the animals’ migratory route. desperately poor. Small farmers, villagers, and townspeople
Before examining the highway proposal, let’s step back for a along the shores of Lake Victoria feel isolated from the rest CHAPTER 11 • Bi odiv ER si T y A nd Cons ER vAT i on Bi ology
broad view of the Serengeti. The people native to this region, the of Tanzania by a poor road system. Walled off by Serengeti
Maasai, are semi-nomadic herders who have long raised cattle National Park to their east (which does not allow commer-
on the grasslands and savannas. Because the Maasai subsisted cial truck traffic on its few dirt roads), these people have little
on their cattle and lived at low population densities, wildlife thrived access to outside markets to buy and sell goods. In response,
here long after it had declined in other parts of Africa. Tanzania’s president Jakaya Kikwete promised them he would
When East Africa was under colonial rule, the British cre- build a paved commercial highway across the Serengeti. The
ated game reserves to conserve wildlife. Once Tanzania, Kenya, highway would connect towns on Lake Victoria with cities to
and other African nations gained independence in the mid- the east and ports on the Indian Ocean. The World Bank and
20th century, the British reserves became the basis for today’s the German government offered to finance the $480-million
national protected areas. Serengeti National Park was estab- project, and Chinese contractors stood ready to build it.
lished in 1951, and the Maasai Mara National Reserve was Around the world, conservationists reacted with alarm.
CHAPTER 11 • Bi odiv ER si T y A nd Cons ER vAT i on Bi ology
later established just across the border in Kenya. These two The proposed highway would slice right through the middle of
protected areas, together with several adjacent ones, encom- the wildebeest migration path (Figure 11.1). Scientists predicted
pass the Serengeti ecosystem. This 30,000-km (11,500-mi ) that the road and its vehicles would physically block migration 293
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