Impact of decentralised forest management on forest cover changes in the north eastern Tanzania

This study aimed to assess the impact of decentralised forest management on forest cover changes in the north eastern Tanzania. Six contrasting forests namely: Shagayu (JFM), Shume-Magamba (fexclusive state management) and Sagara (CBFM) in the montane, and Handeni Hill (JFM), Kiva Hill (exclusive state management) and Kwakirunga (CBFM) in semi-arid forests were studied. Forest cover changes were assessed for periods before and after decentralised forest management. Cover maps were derived from Landsat Thematic Mapper (TM) and Enhanced Thematic Mapper (ETM) images. Forest inventory techniques were used to estimate tree harvests as major drivers of forest cover changes. The area under closed forest cover decreased substantially ranging from 0.4%.y-1 to 1.3%.y-1 in the montane forests with higher forest loss recorded under exclusive state management. In the semi-arid, the forest under JFM experienced substantial increase in forest cover (+3.5%.y-1) as compared to exclusive state management and CBFM. More tree basal area were harvested under exclusive state management in the montane study forests as compared to JFM and CBFM and the differences were significant (p<0.05). In the semi-arid study forests, higher tree harvests were recorded under CBFM followed by JFM and exclusively state and the differences were significant (p<0.05). It was observed in this study that, regardless of management regime, participating villagers were unable to exclude people with no formal rights to the forests under PFM. It is therefore concluded that, decentralised management can impact forest resources both positively and negatively depending on institutional arrangements. However, some empirical evidence indicates that JFM and CBFM performed better than those under exclusive state management, although uncontrolled exploitation of the forest has continued also under these regimes. Although the two regimes are promising forest decentralisation models for Tanzania, more research is needed to understand the functions of different governance structures for decentralized forest management to achieve the goal of improving forest condition. Keywords : decentralised forest management, forest cover, montane, semiarid, north eastern Tanzania