| In Tanzania,the period of 1990s was characterized by high demand for land reforms to address the major land use problems which resulted from increased rapid population growth.These problems included conflicts among land users,insecurity of land tenure,poor development of land markets,degradation of soil and water resources,deforestation,and increased migrations of people and livestock.As a result,several land use policies such as participatory village land use planning,improvement of land use right and tenure,land markets development,and strategies for combating land degradation were put into place.The main aim of this study was to investigate whether and to what extent the laid down land use policies have been in practice.A combination of both quantitative and qualitative approaches with multiple data collection method was applied in this study.Face to face interview was conducted to solicit the views of policy makers and policy implementers such as the Ministry of Land,Housing and Human Settlements Development,the National Land Use Planning Commission(NLUPC),Kigoma Regional Commissioners’ Office-regional planning division and the views of district land officers from three districts of Kigoma region.Basing purposive sampling technique,a household survey was conducted from July 2017 to November 2017.A survey questionnaire was addressed to 750 villagers residing in four different districts namely: Kigoma rural,Kasulu,Buhigwe and Uvinza.Respondents were asked to fill in a questionnaire covering aspects related to participatory village land use planning,land use rights and tenure,land markets development,and strategies for combating land degradation.This study however,could not find major qualitative changes observed after land policy reform.Indicating that major land use problems such as conflicts among land users,insecurity of land tenure,poor development of land markets,degradation of soil and water resources,deforestation,and increased migrations of people and livestock have not been fully addressed and therefore they still exist.The Tanzanian government however,still faces limited budget,the planned budget is always not realistic and therefore most village land use planning programs have not been accomplished.As a results more conflicts among land users have continued to occur.Nevertheless,most land use conflicts in Tanzania are triggered by insecurity of land tenure and contradiction between customary and statutory land tenure.A policy strategy like participatory village land use planning was meant to prevent or resolve land conflicts in Tanzania rural.In this strategy,clear difference between customary and statutory land tenure is practically presented.Furthermore,through this strategy land boundaries are inclusively identified and demarcated so as to improve land use right and tenure hence to avoid land conflicts.Moreover,there still a challenge on improving land markets particularly in rural areas.Rural land markets are in critical situation.While there has been improvement on land markets in and around urban centers,in most rural areas situation is different.The study findings reveal that,rural land lack clear land information available in the market.Such information are pivotal to give more details about land be they in terms of size,location,soil fertility,and whether surveyed or not.Therefore,there must be deliberate government efforts to implement village land use planning through which land is surveyed and store land information into the data base.Not even that,the findings further reveled that land market in the rural areas has continued not to be favorable to farmers.When village farmers apply for loans,the banks impose conditions which make the poor farmers fail to get the loan.In addition,land degradation has become a predominant challenge in Tanzania.The It has been reported that,overexploitation of land resources have resulted into continuous desertification,loss of biodiversity,deforestation,water degradation as well as land degradation.Bad practices like shifting cultivation,overgrazing,collecting wood for energy,drought,and fires have caused land to lose its old appearance.Unregulated movements of pastoralists with their livestock have continued to persist despite government intervention on the matter.For example Sukuma people still keep migrating with large groups of cattle from their place of origin(Lake Victoria Zone)to areas with low livestock population density like Kigoma region.This tendency has indeed contributed to land degradation and has resulted into major land conflicts involving herders and farmers in the region.Generally,the findings in this study revealed that,there is a weakness in the policy implementation process,therefore,is suggesting a novel policy implementation model whereby components such as political will,capacity building imperative,public awareness,public integrity restoration,law enforcement,and principle of evaluation are underscored in facilitating sufficient policy accomplishment.The proposed model stresses on analysis of the five components arranged in stages namely political will,capacity building,public awareness,public integrity and law enforcement.Analysis serves as a foundation on which the aforementioned five stages operate.The predominant idea here is to examine and find out whether the key components of the policy implementation model are precisely sited to screen the implementation process.Finally,an evaluation procedure is performed to judge the proficiency of the policy implementation. |
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