Hunger Threatens Hadzabe, the Africa’s Remains Hunter-Gatherers-Community


By ADAM IHUCHA -- A severe famine is threatening to wipeout, probably one of Africa’s most endangered indigenous communities living in northern Tanzania. 
 Hadzabe ethnic group, a surviving relic of the hunter-gatherers remains on earth, whose population does not exceed 1,500, basically survives on what nature provides, particularly, wild fruits, honey, and wild meat. 
 However, due to industrial development, especially logging, agriculture, mining as well as effect of climate change in Lake Eyasi basin in Karatu district, Arusha, the fruits and tubers have been depleted.  
 A Hadza elder, Kankono Mkanga says that they have reached a point where they could go with empty stomachs for five days and the government seems unaware.
 “We have reached a point where we can go out hunting for five consecutively days without spotting any wild animal, getting honey or fruits” Mr Mkanga says. 
 He blames farmers and livestock keepers for grabbing their ancestral lands and deforestation, causing loss of natural vegetation and wild animals, which constitute the community’s staple food.

“We have witnessed an influx of farmers and pastoralists taking our natural resource rich land,” says Mr Mkanga, who believes that such land grab and deforestation have contributed to the hunger situation they are in as a community.

For centuries, the remote Eyasi basin had been a Hadzabe base, but now it has turned into significant agricultural zone with its products being among items eaten on the dining tables in Western Europe.
Official data shows that the fertile area is now dominated by nearly 4,000 farmers, who produce 97,328 tonnes of onion annually, accounting for one third of the East African 'Bombay Red' and 'Red Crole' onion production.
Arusha Regional Commissioner’s office statistics indicate that whereas Eyasi basin has a total of 3,600 hectors, 2,071 ha out of them were indeed under irrigation farming. 
This means that Hadzabe community, not being in position to defend their own rights, has been confined into 1,529 hectors out of original 3,600 they inherited from their ancestral thousand years ago.

Implications
Hadzabe community, which its traditional life style doesn’t support a culture of keeping food stock, in recent years, has been dependent on food aid from faith based organization, government as well as handouts from tourists, all of which have not been availed to them this year.
“We basically live on food aid from different churches and the government but unfortunately this year around no institution has remembered us,” says Hadza senior, Mr. Mambosi Ashomo.

On dependence on earnings from tourists, he sadly narrated that they cannot wait for the low season to come to an end, as hands out from tourist philanthropists are very helpful.

“Apart from food aid, we also live on gifts from tourists who visit us but it is not tourists’ season so we are basically stack” Mr. Ashomo explained.

Lake Eyasi division officer, Mr. Laanyuni Ole Supuk, confirmed that the Hadzabe group in his area is in a dire need of food.

“These people are normally shy and live in the bush so it is so difficult to get in touch with them and know their plight. But last week I learnt about their hunger through a well-wisher” Mr Supuk says.

He is currently busy contacting the high-ranking officials in the central government over the possibility of getting emergency food to supply to the community.

Mr. Suupuk appealed to the state and any other well -wishers to supply them with at least 80 tones of emergency cereals, to start with, as he doesn’t know the exact volume of food requirements.

Historical injustice

Their ancestral homelands originally covered large parts of northern Tanzania with abundant wildlife resources like the world heritage sites of Serengeti national park and Ngorongoro Conservation Area.

The areas were and still a home to a wide array of wildlife and to a range of flora that includes the magnificent baobab trees of Africa - home in turn to the bees from which the Hadzabe collect wild honey.

But, due to contemporary conservation drive, the government has since turned these areas into national parks where the indigenous people are not allowed to perpetuate their subsistence activities, such as hunting, fruit gathering and honey collection.

As a result, the Hadzabe, are facing severe pressure on their traditional way of life as their habitats have been converted into conservation areas and agricultural farms.

''The situation is very critical for the tribe, whose population does not exceed 1,500, in the country'' says Edward Ole Lekaita, a Lawyer with Ujamaa Community Resource Team (U-CRT), a NGO working for the rights of marginalized indigenous community in Tanzania.

Mr Lekaita who spent almost four years now, seeking for a better way of helping the probably forgotten indigenous community, says Hadzabe tribe is virtually under threat of extinction as the forests, which are their homes and the basis of their livelihood, have been under threat from other competing land users.

“Special treatment and specific affirmative actions are more than necessary for the survival of this unique and most important group of humans” he noted.

He, however, blamed the situation on poor government policies, which he said do not specifically recognize indigenous rights and cultural practices, rather than favour conservation of huge chunks of land for wildlife hunting at the expense of indigenous people.

Critics say efforts to resettle them in permanent villages have failed. Instead, they have attracted researchers from all over the world and sympathizers among civil society organisations who insist they should have access to their habitats.

The Hadzabe survive using the most ancient subsistence practices and technology known to human beings. 

They hunt animals with bows and arrows and gather wild fruit and plants.

They hunt all manner of game from small animals such as dik dik, bush pig and antelope, to large creatures such as wildebeest and giraffe, using arrows with poisoned tips. 

The Hadzabe women and children gather fruits, honey and tuber roots that make up a large and important part of their diet.

“Pushing these people out of their traditional habitat and attempting to settle them permanently or further integrate them into society may have tragic consequences” Mr Lekaita warns.

Human rights activists fear that their rich culture could be lost forever.  Not being in a position to fight for their own rights, the Hadzabe are people in need of protection, they argue.

Recognition
However, Tanzania intends to recognized minority groups, including Hadzabe in the new constitution. 

Article 45 of the blueprint, recognized minority groups - such as hunter-gatherers – mainly Hadzabe and Akiye ethnic groups, for the first time in 50-years of independence.

The article specifically provides that the state shall put in place affirmative action programmes designed to ensure that minority groups participate and represented in governance.

Other rights provided for includes special opportunities in educational, employment and economic fields, something which was not articulated in the previous constitution.

The draft also provides that the groups would be given land to develop their practices and cultural values, settlement and food, among others.

Richard Baalow, a Hadzabe elder, says that the draft constitution come as a relief to one of Africa’s last hunter-gatherer tribes.

“We as a community are very happy with the news that the draft constitution recognises us. We are also grateful to the commission for taking into consideration our opinions,” Mr Baalow said in a telephone interview.

He demanded that parliament enacts specific laws to protect their interests in land and more importantly, their right to perpetuate their traditional way of life without restrictions.

At the moment, the biggest enemy of Hadzabe hunter-gatherers of Yaeda Chini is the Wildlife Act of 2009, which has criminalised them as poachers because the law does not allow anybody to hunt without a licence.

While Tanzania was taking steps to recognize the rights of minority groups like the Hadzabe, in South America the Brazilian government was forced to use an air force plane to fly Munduruku Indians out for negotiations over a new dam that the government wants to build in their homeland. 

The Munduruku (Mundurucu or Wuy Jugu) are an indigenous people of Brazil living in the Amazon River basin, who in 2010 had an estimated population of 11,640.

United Nations says in its website that the realization of indigenous peoples’ right to food depends crucially on their access to and control over the natural resources in the land and territories they occupy or use.
“Industrial development, especially mining and logging, as well as urban sprawl have polluted land, water and air,” reads U.N statement.
The World body further says the creation of reserves; national parks, private lands and over-fishing have further reduced the areas and resources available to indigenous hunters, fishers and gatherers.
Changing environmental conditions due to climate change that jeopardize traditional food species further exacerbate food insecurity.
Recent practices violating indigenous peoples’ intellectual property rights – such as “bioprospecting” or “biopiracy” – pose a threat to indigenous peoples’ genetic resources and traditional knowledge.
Indigenous peoples want to be consulted about the ways their knowledge is used, and to equitably share in any benefits.

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1 comments:

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