Community Poultry Project for Conserving the Wildlife Species in Magombera Forest, Tanzania

Abstract

Aims: Poaching of wildlife is a major challenge in their conservation, including endemic ones like Procolobus gordonorum Matschie. Local communities in Udzungwa and Magombera poach for subsistence and small scale commerce. The Community poultry project adjacent to Magombera forest contributed towards enhancing the conservation of wildlife species through providing community with poultry as an alternative livelihood where meat and income can be generated in legal and convenient methods. Place and Duration of Study: This study took place in communities surrounding the Magombera Forest in the Morogoro region of Tanzania. The study was conducted from July 2018 to January 2019. Methodology: Random semi-structured questionnaires with Likert scaling were administered to 119 local community members neighbouring the Magombera Forest.  A training workshop in which the participants were trained on veterinary and improved rearing practices in order to address the challenges were administered to 52 participants, followed by pre- and post-training evaluation questions that assessed the challenges and opportunity for poultry keeping. Results: Sixty one percent of respondents reported that they kept chickens before training, after training all showed an inclination to keep chickens for meat and income generation. The respondents reported that challenges for poultry keeping are diseases control, market for products, rearing system and predators and parasites. Conclusion: Training on poultry production to enhance conservation of biodiversity in Magombera forest is essential.  However from this study it is clear that crucial challenges (such as diseases) for successful poultry production, specified by local communities, need to be dealt with first.