About Forest Nature Reserve
Tanzania is endowed with different terrains and climates, which allow the lives of various species of flora and fauna. The country has both the highest and the lowest points in Africa i.e the top of Mount Kilimanjaro and the floor of Lake Tanganyika respectively.
Mount Kilimanjaro is in the Northeastern while Lake Tanganyika is in the West. Tanzania is situated just south of the Equator and was formed as a sovereign state in 1964 through the union of the theretofore – separate states of Tanganyika and Zanzibar.
Tourism is one of the key economic sectors in Tanzania. The sector has shown impressive growth over the past few years and brought about macro-economic diversification from the traditional reliance on agriculture. The country is recognized as one of the best tourist destinations in the world due to its vast tourism attractions.
Essentially, more than 25% of the total land is dedicated to wildlife protection and other natural resources protection areas. Tanzania Forest Services Agency (TFSA), is among the Government agencies under the Ministry of Natural Resources and Tourism mandated to manage and conserve Central Government forests and bee reserves and forests in the general lands in Tanzania.
These forests vary from high montage forests mainly located in Eastern Arc Mountains areas, lowland forests, Miombo woodlands, plantation forests and Mangrove forests all with high endemism in terms of flora and fauna, hence being potential for ecotourism activities. To date, a total of 20 forest reserves have been upgraded to Nature Forest Reserves due to their biodiversity richness.
Tanzania Forest Services (TFS) has been promoting these forests and the cultures and traditions of the adjacent communities among the country’s tourist attractions. The Forest Nature Reserve (FNR) category of the protected area offers the highest level of protection under the National Forest Act of Tanzania.
The Forest Nature Reserve FNRs are state-owned and are managed by the Tanzania Forest Services (TFS) Agency. No extraction of woody or animal species is allowed in these FNRs and activities are generally restricted to research, education and nature-based tourism.
To date, Twelve (12) Forest Nature Reservers (FNRs) of Amani (8,380ha), Uluguru (24,115ha), Kilombero (134,511ha), Nilo (6,225ha), Rungwe (13,652ha); Magamba (9,283ha), Chome (14,283ha) and Mkingu (23,388ha), Uzungwa Scarp (32,763ha), Rondo Plateau (14,000ha), Minziro (25,000ha) and Mount Hanang (5,871ha) have been fully proclamation as NFRs.
An ongoing process to submit a dossier to the UNESCO Commission for advancing a number of these NFRs to a World Heritage Status (WH) is at an advanced stage. The ongoing process to review and ultimately re-submit the dossier to UNESCO at a later stage accordingly is at a higher status. The revised World Heritage (WH) dossier is now ready for submission to UNESCO after endorsement and approval by the Government of the United Republic of Tanzania.
