PARLIAMENTARY ENGAGEMENT IN ADVOCATING FOR POLICY REFORMS IN WILDLIFE CONSERVATION AND TOURISM SECTOR
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Tanzania Natural Resource Forum (TNRF) in collaboration with the Joint Advocacy Taskforce (JAT) members and Tanzania Private Sector Foundation (TPSF) through "Engaging Civil Society Organisations (CSOs), Communities and Private Sector in advocacy" project had a meeting with twenty (20) Tanzania Parliamentarians Friends of Environment (TAPAFE). The meeting took place in Dodoma- Morena Hotel on 8th September, 2018.
The main objective of the meeting was to create awareness of the members of parliament in order to influence change in policies and other legal framework related to wildlife conservation and tourism.
TAPAFE members were oriented through the crosscutting environmental problems as they are in the legal framework and recommendations were given. Among many issues presented from the three mentioned categories, the following were key issues discussed;
- Transparency in collection and timely disbursement of revenue in wildlife management areas
- Challenges in tourism business environment such as multiplicity of fees and levies for tour operators and limited statistical data for tourism as well as the contradictory definition of “A Tourist”
- Environmental destruction which leads to tremendous loss of forestry, forest cover and disturbance of the ecological functions for example Great Ruaha River.
At the end of the meeting, Members of Parliament (MPs) shared their experiences, opinions and questions on the subjects presented and they were impressed with the joint efforts made by the CSOs (Advocacy taskforce) and TPSF of bringing together the policy makers to raise their awareness which are necessary in the process of advocating for legal reforms.
The following came out and as the way forward:
- The joint advocacy taskforce to come up with a clear list of all conflicting policies, acts, laws and regulations that challenges conservation, tourism and environment in general to be taken by TAPAFE members for sharing with the respective standing committee for effectiveness.
- The Joint Advocacy taskforce should also arrange a platform with the Standing Committee for Land, Natural Resource and Tourism for the same presentation to build their capacity.