Land Use Conflicts Escalation as Aftermath of Pastoralists In-migration in Rufiji District, Tanzania

Abstract

Pastoralists’ migration has created land-use pressure and conflicts in many areas. A cross-sectional study was conducted in Rufiji district to collected Surveys, Focus group discussions, interviews, and documentary reviews were used to collect data. Multistage sampling techniques was applied to select the divisions, wards and villages for the study. The kth factor formula was applied to pick the sampled villages and households for the study. A semi-structured questionnaire was administered among 200 households. Forty (40) respondents from 40 households who were purposively selected from each of the 5 villages which made a total of 200 respondents who aged above 30 years in the period of data collection and who have been in the village since 2000 or before. Content analysis was the main technique for analysing data which were collected through the key informant interviews and focus group discussions. Moreover, data collected using the questionnaire were analysed using descriptive statistics. The findings showed that land-use conflicts occur the study area that escalated after the arrival of pastoralists, however, the occurred conflicts have been solved through various techniques and through involvement of different stakeholders as conflict resolution actors. The most erupting conflict is between pastoralists and natives crop farmers. The findings also show that there were efforts and mechanisms to reduce the land-use conflicts including involvement of the stakeholders in conflict resolutions. The study concludes that land-use conflicts and the conflicting actors have increased since the arrival of pastoralists. The study recommends the establishment of proper mechanisms of resettling pastoralists in the study area, the need to strengthen locally applied techniques to resolve land-use conflicts than enforcing laws and by-laws, ensuring that all villages have established and allocated areas for pastoralists and native farmers to undertake their economic activities. The village government officials should observe and respect procedures for land allocation as stipulated in the Tanzania Village land act.