THEATISING ENVIRONMENTAL CONSERVATION1

By

DR. AUGUSTIN HATARSENIOR LECTURER

ERROL BARROW CENTRE FOR CREATIVE IMAGINATIONUNIVERSITY OF THE WEST INDIES

Email: augustin.hatar@cavehill.uwi.edu

1 This paper was a result of a SIDA SAREC research project undertaken bythe author in the Uluguru Mountains of Morogoro. It was presented at a conference at the International Conference on Perspectives and Approaches for Sustainable Rural development in Africa, Sokoine University of Agriculture, Morogoro, Tanzania, February 18 – 20, 2004, and thereafter published in their proceedings. It has been slightly revised

ABSTRACT

One of the dilemmas facing environmentalconservationists, is how to make the community membersrealized that conservation efforts are indeed for their ownbenefit. A 1953 proposed forest policy enacted in 1961 inthen Tanganyika had as the first objective the need to"reserve in perpetuity for the benefit of present and futureinhabitants of the country, sufficient forested land or landcapable of afforestation to preserve or improve localclimates and water supplies, (and) stabilize land which isliable to deterioration…" yet the truth is that the forestshave been cut, the climate has changed, water flows havebeen affected and land has deteriorated.

In the Uluguru mountains of Morogoro in CentralTanzania, the mountains have been virtually laid bare. Fromthick covers of years ago, now only bare rocks and a fewstunted shrubs are what is left after years of misuse. InMorogoro town, at the base of the mountains, the streams nolonger flow as they used to, and the climate, according tolong time inhabitants, has changed considerably, such thatit is much warmer.

The government has reacted somewhat and halted treecutting in a batch of the forest at the very top of themountains and has also tried some reforestation with someexotic trees. The problem however is that the villagers arenot so sensitive to the dilemma facing them and continue tosneak into the forests, especially for firewood, poles forbuilding, timber for sale to timber hungry "low-landers" andhunting a few left-over deer.

The paper discusses efforts aimed at sensitizing thecommunity members living up in the mountain areas that

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conserving the forest that is left and planting more treeswhich they can use for their firewood and for building wouldbe to their advantage.

Through the use of community theatre, and afterpreliminary research at the level of the district, localauthorities as well as the communities living in themountains, we produced two short plays reflecting theimportance of planting trees. The first was youth orientedand the other more generic and sought to emphasize the roleand importance of planting, and protecting trees as a meanstowards improving their own welfare and, ultimately, theenvironment.

In two years of the project 60,000 trees were plantedand the effort was still going on at our last visit. Howeverdespite the apparent and visible success of the treeplanting exercise, there was no serious follow-up by otherwould be interested parties This of course raises thequestion of who really cares about development projects,especially once they do what they have to do and then cometo an end, having done what they were “supposed” to do.

I IntroductionInterest in research on using theatre for the

reforestation of the Uluguru mountains rose out ofcoincidental work we had been doing in Morogoro usingtheatre to try and sensitize young school girls to stay awayfrom temptations that could lead to HIV/AIDS. We had beenworking in Morogoro for a week and one day as we stood overa bridge of the river in the heart of Morogoro that comesdown from the mountains, someone remarked how the waterlevel in that river had been getting less and less over theyears.

This also equally linked up with something else we hadseen in Morogoro at the regional agricultural centre, aswell as at the farm of Sokoine University of Agriculture.

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Both farms used to rely substantially on irrigation butaccording to farm hands we talked to, the water from up themountains was no longer enough to cover their irrigationrequirements.

The work we had been doing in theatre was based on theunderstanding that theatre, as a means of communication canbe a powerful tool for behaviour change. More particularly,our interest in theatre was with the community based typewhere the very people in the community take up an issue ofinterest and then create an information and communicationpackage, via the medium of theatre to try and sensitisetheir fellow community members about the merits and/ordemerits of certain actions (Mlama 1991, Mda 1993).

This implied, as Zakes Mda (1993) had noted the peoplethemselves sifting through the issues, creating theirunderstanding of such issues and then equally creating someform of a community response to such eventualities. Thiscan be a physical plan of action or even knowledge gainedthat would be then used consciously or subconsciously.

We thought therefore that in view of the work we hadbeen doing in theatre, and the already identified problemwith regard to water levels and the Uluguru mountains wecould try to use theatre to sensitise the people living upin the mountains about the necessity to wake up to theirenvironment.

For people living in an environment like that, theyobviously would have many more issues "paining" them thanjust environment, the way it is put in Kiswahili, Mazingira.They would have problems of poverty, of sufficient food to"battle" the cold, communication (eg. roads, telephone,radios, and so on), diseases, education and unemployment.While many such problems are results of a destroyedenvironment, we thought such "scientificity" may not quite clickwith the community members. We therefore opted isolating one

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element around which our work would be based: that of usingcommunity theatre to persuade them to plant trees.

Our guiding question in our work was whether, byproducing a community based play that highlighted theimportance of trees, having the play performed and thenoffering some seedlings during the performances as anincentive and eye opener, would the community members pickup our central theme and plant their own trees?

II Background to ProblemIn recent years, there has been an increasing

realization that we are slowly but surely destroying theworld we are living in by our constant and increasing misuseof our natural resources. The forest covers and the animalworld that lived in those forests have dwindled to such anextent that in order to save some of the remnants, laws havehad to be enacted. Yet in spite of those laws human kindcontinues to have the urge to use some of those resourcesunder protection.

The truth is that there is no choice about the use ofour natural resources, as our lives depend on such use. Weneed trees to build our houses or for firewood; we needanimal protein and we need more farm land on which to growour other food stocks. Conservation, therefore, of existingforests and whatever they contain appears illogical in viewof our more pressing needs of staying alive. Thus thepopulace would rather cut the forests in order to grow morecorn and hunt the animals in the forests to provide meat fortheir families.

The dilemma resulting from this is that it is thoseforests in particular that help to stabilize climates andsoils, and it is also those forests in which the animalslive that they need for meat. Hence reducing the forestcover automatically implies destabilizing the climate thatis so essential for the growing of their corn. Cutting theforest cover implies the animals they need for their meat

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have to move to areas far from where those people live.Ultimately then, the populace become the losers in the longrun as they get poorer and poorer returns, and are forced toencroach even more on the forests, a scenario for futuredisaster.

The people, however, know the value of the forests andthe animals and do realize that in their lifetime they havelost many of the forest resources that used to be abundant.In the Uluguru mountains, where this project was based, in adiscussion between the author and 3 men and a woman betweenthe ages of 35-60, they identified the following species oftrees as having virtually disappeared:

Swahili Scientific name (Mbuya et al1994)

Mkole Grewia similiaMpera pori Combretum schumaniiMkangazi Khaya nyasicaMninga Pterocarpus angolensisMng'ong'o Sclenocarya birrcaMvule Vangueria infaustaMuegea (a medicine plant)

They also cited the following animals that have virtuallydisappeared, or have moved very far:

Swahili EnglishMbega mweusi Black colobusMbega mwekundu Red colobusNgolanga (could not find a name)Mbawala Could not find a name)Kuro Water buckPongo Bush buckTandala mkubwa Greater kuduSwalapala ImpalaDigidigi Dick dickSungura Rabbits

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Nungu nungu Porcupine

They also mention several insects and birds that have movedfar away or are simply no longer seen.

While it may not be possible at this point in time toreplace those species, literature indicates, for examplethat if reasonable reforestation was embarked on, it ispossible to see some species, come back, or some of thebirds and other small wildlife return (Kingdom & Howell1993).

The problem therefore is that whereas the people in theUluguru Mountains know that there is a problem, theycontinue to exploit the forest resources and the result ismore degradation for their soils and an unstable climate.

The Uluguru Mountains towering over Morogoro where thisresearch project was based indeed provided an interestingcase study. The mountains which used to be covered with anample tree cover have how virtually been laid bare, exceptfor a forest reserve at the very crown of the mountains.Lower down the mountains as indicated before, the water flowhas been so drastically reduced, that the experimentalirrigation systems for the Ministry of Agriculture (nowPrison Farms) and Sokoine University have nearly died out.

Rodgers (1993) has argued that one should not talk ofconservation unless one provides viable alternatives to thecommunities which have to conserve. Thus for conservationto make sense, he argues, the people should be made tounderstand it, and understand the consequences of theunfettered use of the natural resources at our disposal.More than understanding, however, the people ought to beshown viable alternatives which will reduce their pressureon the urge to “mis-exploit” the natural resources.

A viable alternative, as Rodgers (1993) points out, andas has been clearly demonstrated at the Udzungwa National

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Park is for the people living in the mountains to planttrees that they themselves will use for their daily needslike firewood or building their houses, and even for timberthat can be sold for cash. According to the Director ofUdzungwa National Park, (personal testimony) even animalshave started to come back in the areas where the communityre-planted trees. Could this also be possible for theUluguru

III Literature Review

An Overview of Literature about the MountainsThe mountain forests of the Uluguru Mountains is part

of a long chain of mountain forests that stretch fromEthiopia down to Malawi. (Lovett & Wasser, 1993) and someeven argue that they stretch South to Namibia (Werger,1978). They are part of the tropical rain forests, and someof these forests are to be found along the estuaries ofrivers (Lovett & Wasser, 1993). The prominent foreststhough have dwindled in size, (Rodgers 1993) they covermajor mountainous areas in Kenya, Uganda, Tanzania, Malawiand on to the South and they form a kind of arc that hasbeen extremely useful in trapping rains for the regions inwhich they are found (Lovett, 1993).

The forests however, despite their enormoussignificance of stabilizing the climate with particularregard to temperatures and rainfall, have been buffeted tosuch an extent that the governments of Kenya, Uganda andTanzania have come to realize that something needs to bedone about them (Rodgers, 1993).

During the colonial times, both the British and theGermans recognized the importance of the forests as watercatchments although they also permitted logging to a limitedextent. This advent of colonialism to permit logging didbegin to upset the ecological balance, as previously,exploitation of the forests had been only minimal for polesto build, hunting for food and other limited uses such as

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trees for rituals or for medicine. The colonial systemhowever demanded much greater use. They required a lot moretimber both for local consumption and even for export, andin addition to putting pressure on the forests, they alsoput pressure on the communities living close to the forests(Rodgers, 1993).

In Tanzania, for example, some communities moved upinto the mountains and forest areas to escape Germancolonial pressure. In the cleared forest areas there begansome human settlements which implied cultivation and animalhusbandry which meant cutting down even more of the forest.There were also incidences of forest fires and so on. Thusforests which had largely not been disturbed began to feelthe pressure (Kjekshus, 1897, Jurji, 1980).

The Eastern Arc Mountains in which the Uluguru'sbelong, did not escape the predicament that befell the otherforest areas. The Germans established a station at Bunduki,in the heartland of the mountains in order to exploit atclose quarters some of the products of the forests (Rodgers,1993). By 1914 however, the Germans in Tanzania, in view oftheir recognition of the importance of the forestsespecially as water catchments, proposed that some of theremaining forest patches on the mountains become forestreserves, and they allowed only limited timber cutting.They also started programmes of reforestation. By 1914, 231separate forest reserves had been gazetted and these wereessentially the mountain and coastal forests. The firstworld war disrupted many of these plans and in factincreased pressure on the forests as some peasants fled intothe forests to escape enlistment (Rodgers, 1993).

When the British took over from the Germans after thewar they began by also recognizing that forest cover wasvery important and needed to be reserved. Most of themountain forests that had been gazetted as reserve thereforeremained so. Even in areas in North Eastern Tanzania wheretea growing was established, 40% of the land had to remain

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as forest. The policy changed in the late forties howeverwith the colonial forestry office arguing for privilegingeconomic production rather than forestry conservation andthe forests were attacked again until the late fifties whenthe ravage was seen and forest protection ensued againincluding replanting the devastated areas with exotic treeslike it was done "in all the commonwealth.. replacement oflocal timbers by plantation of exotic trees.." (Hamilton &Mwasha, 1990).

Another parallel conservation movement cited by Rodgers(1993) is that which goes with National Parks. This alsohappened in the fifties with Serengeti in 1951 and severalgame reserves in which hunting was forbidden up to 1964.The problem, as Rodgers notes is that while strict laws wereenacted for national parks, none were ever acted for forestreserves, and no forest reserves were ever upgraded intonational park status until recently with the growth oftourism. No trees were banned from being cut and trees inforest reserves were never seen with the same importance, orgiven the same protection as the animal in national parks.

Post independence policy has been both hot and coldabout these forests. While the stated government policy(Government Draft Forest Policy, 1986) recognizes theimportance of forests as water catchments, climatestabilization, and to protect land from deterioration, thepractice has not been so successful. The policy furthermore recognizes the need for the forests to be a source foreconomic input for the country and the communities as wellas an important resource for science, recreation and otherthings. It calls for urban and rural communities to plantand maintain forests of their own and seeks to establish anextension service in order to "advance knowledge andunderstanding among the people of (Tanzania) on the valuesand benefits of forests to them and to their descendants."

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From the forest policy was developed a forestry actionplan which sought, among other things - (Tanzania ForestAction Plan, 1989):i) to enhance the forest sector contribution to the

national economic development especially in the keylinkages to agriculture and water

ii) to involve local people in forest based rural,development activities

iii) to augment conservationiv) to promote conservation awareness etc.

While, therefore, the importance of preserving andprotecting these tropical rain/mountain forests (in additionto other forests) is well known and is basis of twogovernment strategy documents, implementation has beensomewhat lax.

Rodgers (1993) cites a number of reasons that have ledto the failure of implementing the noble conservationpolicies, in many developing countries among which one canpoint out:a) The lack of alternatives for forest users especially in

the local rural communities. These are people whodepend on the forests for firewood, for poles to buildtheir houses, for medicinal plants etc. Withoutproviding an alternative, the people would still go tothe forests to satisfy their needs.

b) Lack of proper knowledge by the community about theimportance of conservation. Many of the programs aboutconservation have been of "DON’T…” rather than thosecalling for real understanding of the issues. In anycase before “communalization” of forest products, theexploitation of the forests by the local communities wasonly minimal.

c) Pressure on the communities for agricultural land. Thecommunities which live around the forest areas havecontinued to expand (Kurji, 1980) requiring more land

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for food production or grazing. The constantdeforestation has led to the degradation of the soilsand even change in the weather such that the communitiesfeel they should cut down even more forest so as toplant even more food, not realizing that they would bemuch the worse.

d) Lack of other gainful employment in a world of "casheconomy". Those who live near the forests, just likeeveryone else require money, and they know timber/treescan sell for money. The temptation therefore is greatfor cutting down trees in order to make some money.

e) Lack of strong follow-up implementation strategy.Rodgers notes, for example, that whereas there are tensof national park guards, a major forest reserve may haveone or utmost 2 guards. The guards themselves have poorsalaries, they lack basic working amenities likeuniforms, boots, transport and other allowances and soon. Such a situation therefore cannot provide enoughmotivation for strict and efficient supervision offorests.

In view of the above problems therefore would a projectaiming at helping the communities living adjacent to thesemountains to understand better the vicissitudes of theirenvironment make a dent in those communities about the needand importance of conservation?

Mnzava (1980) Rodgers (1993) and both Tanzaniagovernment documents recognize that the people, onceconscienticised about the importance of the forests, can bethe best implementers of a conservation policy. The peoplemust understand clearly the importance of conservation andbe able to propose solutions that they themselves canimplement. It requires that those who know and understandthe problem try to get on the same wave length with thecommunity members in order to draw out strategies that are"do-able" and are also sustainable. Rodgers noted, for

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example, a successful program of forest conservation inRwanda, where community members were made to plant treesthat they themselves could use in a belt round the naturalforest that they had began to cut down.

This project took an approach of trying to encourage thecommunity in the Uluguru mountains to be conscious about thevalue of trees as trees, through the community theatremethodology. The project then provided token seedlings forthe community to plant trees that they themselves will needto use. Hopefully they would then create a forest!

A Brief Overview of the Case for Theatre The community theatre methodology has been defined in

various ways, by various people (Mlama, 1991, Kamlongera,1989 Mda 1993) The use of community theatre adopted forthis research is that put forward by Mda (1993) which refersto a theatre which originates from the community, is enactedby community members for the benefit of the whole communityusually with the assistance of a Catalyst. The implicationand methodology implicit in this understanding of communitytheatre is that the Catalyst, who should be knowledgeableabout theatre and other problems, goes to the community andtogether with the community they research within themselvesthe root causes of their problems, why it is that theseproblems remain unresolved, and what they can themselves doto solve the problems.

The Catalyst then helps the community members to puttogether a dramatization of their problems, based on his/hertheatre skills and also the dramatization of the solutionsas envisaged by the community. Often, the Catalyst helpsthem integrate their own songs and dances which relate tothe problem at hand, and then the performance is staged forthe rest of the community, who can even modify the play orhold discussion about certain issues raised in the playduring or after the performance. This then is followed bycharting a plan of action by the community.

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The debate about the most effective way of communicatingdevelopment messages has not yet been resolved to a degreewhere any one method or medium of communication can be saidto hold sway (Mda, 1993). One of the inherent problems inthis debate is what Felstenhausen (1973) refers to as adilemma of development workers not being communicators andcommunication workers not being trained in development.Early communication models had emphasized sender-receiverapproaches (Shramm 1961, Klapper 1960, Mda 1993), and thecommunity theatre methodology described above was a breakfrom this tradition in that information being used tosensitize the people about the issues is from within theircommunity rather than from outside. The community itself wasthe source and receiver at the same time. The communitycreates a world they can identify with, defines its problemsand propose solutions they are comfortable with via thetheatre medium.

Theatre has the particular advantage of providing liveexamples that are available for all to see, and as theyparticipate in the watching, the individual has anopportunity to debate with his or her conscience and to makea decision about an appropriate course of action. Thisinfluence of theatre dates way back to antiquity. Forexample Plato was so wary of its influence to persuade thathe wanted to ban it from his Republic, while Aristotle wascognisant of its powers that he saw it as a forceful creatorof new opportunities. The early Christian church at firstbanned it for its influence of arousing "un-godly" passions,and later in the middle ages realized that it was a veryuseful method of teaching Christianity to the illiterates whocould not read the Bible for themselves (Carlson 1994).

It is for this reason that the research adopted a strategyof using theatre for sensitization, as there weresufficient indications that it works.

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IV Methodology2

In order to get a sense of the complex, a preliminarysurvey was carried out in the area, whereby a cross sectionof officials and academicians were consulted(administrators, foresters, educators and researchers). Thesecond stage involved the community members who were to workwith us carrying on their own survey in order to ascertainviews held about trees, forests and conservation of theenvironment. Below are tables summarising the interviewsconducted:

Number of Interviews carried out in the communitiesHouseholds Men Women Youth (18-

30Over 30 Tota

lMen women Men Women

36 42 44 30 26 12 18

Interviews with Technical PersonsTAFORI 3SUA 1MWAP 1EDUCATION DEPARTMENT 2WATER DEPARTMENT 1NATURAL RESOURCES & FORESTRY 1PLANNING OFFICER 1DISTRICT EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR 1UMADEP 2TOTAL 13

In the course of the interviews, we selected thevillages of Nyandira and Tchenzema up in the mountains asthey had been pointed out as some of the most affectedareas. For three days, we organized a roundtable discussionwith the community members who had done the research intheir communities. The central issue of course was whypeople do not plant trees, and what they think could be doneto make people plant trees. Furthermore, there was an

2 Field work for this research was done by Ms Joyce Fissoo, Chahya Mtiro and Ngalawa Athanas

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exploration of issues such as their awareness of generalenvironmental issues, and whether there were any specificcases that had happened in their communities that could beattributed to environmental changes - e.g conflicts, successstories and so on.

In those three days, we also asked them to produce anysongs or dances which may have any relationship to theenvironment. Since in most cases of such community play weuse lots of songs and dances, we also asked them to justbring out any songs and dances that were popular in thecommunity.

Putting together the frame of the play took anotherweek after the round table. Because the issues raised bothduring the preliminary research and during the roundtablediscussion were many and varied, we realised they could notbe put in one play, but rather several, as it was difficultto have one thread running through all of them. We producedtwo short plays intermingled with lots of songs and dances.

In our discussions, we had realized as well, that theenvironmental issues were just one aspect of many otherproblems existing in the community where we worked, such asyouth unemployment, the destructive power of a cash economyin an area where producing the "cash" is very limited,diminishing respect of the youths for their elders,matrilineal marriage customs that now put a strain on ahusband as he is expected to move into his mother-in-law'shouse and many others. The plays we produced, described inthe next part, reflected some of those extra issues, inaddition to tree planting.

V ResultsResults from this project will be divided into 3 main

areas as they all have an impact for research on theenvironmental policy for the Uluguru mountains.a) Results of the preliminary research

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b) Results of the roundtable discussionsc) Results from the performancesd) Results from the follow-up visits

a) Results from the preliminary researchThe results of this phase were interesting because it

became apparent that the problem was well known, both fromthe technical point of view and that of the communitypeople. Despite this knowledge, however, little was beingdone at the time of the research to save the UluguruMountains forest cover. Many organizations working in thearea had run out of funding, and as for the government,through its civil servants, it expected that what wasnecessary was being done, and there was expressed hope thatdonors would see the problem and rescue the mountains. Itappeared therefore that there was a crisis of sorts of directresponsibility.

At the district level the crisis was well known, butwhile acknowledging as well the ravages of forest fires,they pointed out that greed for wealth from the forests, aswell as poverty prevailing up the mountains, with no otherguaranteed source of income except from forestry productswould continue to put pressure on the forests. Life in thearea was harsh as the place was "permanently” cold and hencepeople needed a lot of energy to keep going. Moreovercharcoal, building poles, timber and so on had a very goodmarket in the plains below, such that unless there wereother substitutes for satisfying such needs, as Rodgers(1993) had noted, the forests in the mountains would be inperpetual danger.

Another major pitfall for the forests was the nature ofattribution of work at the central level. The waterengineer at the district level was concerned about thedwindling water resources in Morogoro, due to the depletionof the mountain forest cover, but there was little he coulddo as forests were under a separate officer. Sensitization,according to the water engineer was key to the reforestation

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of the mountains as all users were affected differently. Henoted for example that those who cut down forests and treesup in the mountains are not usually the ones affected by,say shortages of water, as this happens down in the valley.The demand for timber, charcoal and building poles by thosefrom the lowlands implies cutting down more forests up inthe mountains, which leads to further deterioration ofagricultural land up in the mountains. This results ingeneral change of weather and hence hardship for thoseengaged in agriculture. Yet all the sectors responsible foradministering the mountain resources are not wellcoordinated to approach the issue jointly.

Another major problem arising from the techniciansconcerns was which trees are "recommendable" for planting inthe mountains. Whereas the indigenous forest cover wasbeing hewed down, there was no clear policy as to whichtrees could be planted to replace them. In the literaturereview we mentioned how the introduction of exotic trees hadaffected water levels in the mountains as well as the landfor agriculture. Trees like the Eucalyptus used so muchwater, and were "other-crop-unfriendly". There was no scientificdata available for the help communities to choose one treespecie over the other, nor were there data that was"translatable" to the people's immediate benefit. Ratherthe people planted trees which they felt were to theirimmediate advantage, regardless of whether they wereenvironmentally friendly or not. Thus a farmer could planteucalyptus trees next to someone else's land rendering theneighbor’s land unusable.

The technicians also noted that it would be difficult toimplement a conservation policy as long as the backgroundproblems that were the root causes were not solved. Suchproblems included the rapid growth of population, theincreasing scale of poverty, unemployment and absence ofmarkets for products from the mountains, such as vegetables.Thus a comprehensive conservation strategy would have todeal also with other problems which in the immediacy did not

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seem related to forests, but were important ingredients tothe mis-use of forests.

With regard to the community members, preliminaryresearch indicated that there was indeed a dilemma in themaking. Yes, they could see what was happening -- waterlevels were low, the rains had changed, it was no longer ascold as it used to be, there were more diseases like Malariaand so on which previously were rare in the mountains, butwhat could they do? What was the direct link between whatwas happening and their demand and use of forest products?

Among the older people, they could remember when therewas more forest cover and the streams were more full, andthe weather was different. Now, they pointed out, therewere frequent quarrels for water to irrigate vegetables andeven the yield was no longer good enough. They also pointedout that the population had increased tremendously and assuch there was even more pressure on the land. Hencerequesting people to plant trees and not exploit for gainwhat was already existing was unlikely to be followed.

A couple of other things also came out of the preliminaryresearch with the people. The first was what has alreadybeen mentioned, lack of clear guidelines on which trees toplants, and insufficient data, in popular terms as to theadvantage or disadvantage of planting certain trees. Thepeople wanted to know, and clearly at that, what trees weregood for what. There had been a rush for eucalyptus,cypress, some forms of conifers, black wattle, grevellia andso on. For trees like the eucalyptus they realized that itwas good for firewood, grew very fast and could provide goodbuilding poles, as well as timber. Yet they were cognizantof the fact that it depleted water sources as well asdamaged land, for agriculture. Hence what trees do theyneed to plant?

Another issue that came out of the preliminary researchwas that of poverty. Seedlings cost money and the people

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did not have that kind of money to spare and thereforesparing the meager resources to buy seedlings did not makegood economic sense. The problem with this is thatapparently the people had not yet been made to see trees inan economic sense, in that spending 1000 shillings to buy 20seedlings of a potential timber tree meant that in about 10years one would have an investment of over 2,000,000shillings in addition to fuel security over all those years.Yet the people did not see the trees this way.

Together with the above, when the community cut downtrees, they did not see it as a negative thing. Rather theysaw it as a fulfillment of a natural obligation. They hadto build houses, they had to have firewood, and they neededextra land in order to eat. "Kuharibu Mazingira" (destroyingthe environment) by cutting down trees did not hit themdirectly in the face and campaigns that just said so did notsink directly in their psyche.

With regard to the youth, their interest was in somethingthat would give them immediate returns. They preferredgrowing vegetables to trees because turnover was in a coupleof months rather than wait for years to get returns fromone’s labor. Worse still though was the shortage of land onwhich to plant the trees. The amount of land they could nowinherit from their parents was so small such that they couldonly plant food crops or those producing income in a shorttime, rather than something likely to produce an income intheir old age.

Another problem that the people raised, was that of nothaving a clear government policy down to the grassroots.The village executive officers themselves were not quiteclear what needed to be done and how, except for the usualslogans of "plant trees to protect the environment”. In one ward,the local councilor had himself allegedly championed cuttingdown forests so that those who vote "can have more land foragriculture”. It is even alleged that the whole hillside next

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to his house which used to be forested had "unexpectedly"caught fire.

What appeared lacking in all this was a clearreforestation policy that was grassroots oriented andunderstood. People had not been properly mobilized orsensitized for tree planting and only those with keenforesight had indulged heavily in tree planting. Someofficers, both from NGOs and government had promised, forexample, to bring seedlings and they had not returned, andothers had not been able to explain in basic language whatwas really required of the people.

Needless to say, the people understood there had been alot of changes due to the changed environment/forest cover.Some animals had disappeared altogether and some birds aswell. It was harder and harder to get some medicinalshrubs, and even more so, some ritualistic trees werebecoming more and more scarce.

One man stood out though, in the mountains, a Mr.Kulinyangwa3, who single handedly had collected seeds from150 different indigenous and endemic trees, and had startedseedbeds to try and popularize such trees. His problem? Noofficial seemed to particularly care!

b) Results from the Roundtable DiscussionsThe roundtable discussions confirmed essentially the

community concerns about the “problematique” of tree planting.At an individual level, the participants related that theyhad never given serious thought to tree planting althoughthree of them did have small plantations. They alsoconfirmed the community concerns about lack of a clearpolicy on which tree to plant, and where. Furthermore, theyagreed that sensitization and public education about trees

3 When we last visited the mountains in 2005, Mr Kulinyangwa had actually moved from the mountains to the lowlands below, as, according to him, no one had recognized his efforts. He was now a maize farmer

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and tree planting and their linkage to the what washappening out there was inadequate. Such factors as lessand more unpredictable rainfall, less water flowing in thecanals to the vegetable gardens, a changed climate and thediminishing returns from the land were never seen directlyby the community as linked to the deforestation of themountains.

The youths in the group were quite categorical. Theyand together with others like them had never given a thoughtto planting trees as investment for the future, the futureof their children and even for their old age. They sawtrees, as taking away land that was useful for fast incomecrops. They admitted they had lost knowledge abouttraditional trees, but they said it was not only them aseven the government did not seem to have a policy about suchtrees.

At the end of the three days of discussion, theparticipating group was a changed group, and in fact a fewof them had started planting trees around their farms andhouses as opposed to the general view that there should beland FREE, and not needed where trees could be planted.

c) Results from the PerformancesThe varied nature of the responses from the preliminary

research and in view of the inter-related nature of theproblems led us to create two short performances whichresponded to the major issues raised. The first play wasmore youth oriented and was about the importance of thetrees in the ordinary lives of the mountain people. A youngman who has opted to take the easy way out in the communityhas fallen in love and wants to get married. He canthowever consummate his marriage unless he brings in acertain ritual tree for splitting in the presence of thecommunity. He steals it and not only that when his wifegives birth, he steals another ritual tree for firewood fora newly delivered mother. He is caught on both accounts,leading to extreme embarrassment to him and the rest of the

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family. In a song the community asks why should any one gothrough this when you can plant your own? The play has othersections of course about youth delinquency, providing foryour family and so on.

The second short play was an amalgamation of theproblems in the community. People are fighting for waterand diverting it from each other's farms. Forest fires havedestroyed hillsides and now it is impossible to get someherbs which used to heal certain diseases children no longerknow names of herbs as the hills sides are bare and no-oneis teaching them anyway; and lazy men who instead ofplanting their own trees in anticipation of what theirchildren will need, feel they can beg trees from neighborswhen needed. When this fails they jealously burn theneighbors trees, but their house catches fire. With allthese problems, the community members opt to go and visit amedicine man, complaining of the afflictions in thecommunity, who tells them that the disasters they areundergoing are of their own making as they have destroyedthe very fabric that had created the right conditions fortheir existence. What they need to do is to try and re-establish some of the conditions that used to exist, forexample by protecting all water sources, planting trees inareas where they had been destroyed and generally improvingthe environment.

The performances of these plays were enthusiasticallyreceived in the communities where they were performed. Sofar by December 1999 there has been 30 performances up inthe mountains all of which were enthusiastically attended.We were present at six of them and the table below indicatesthe place and audiences for the six.

PERFORMING AREAS NUMBER OF ACIDENCENyandira Farmers Centre(SUA)

30

Langali 250Kibuko 200

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Tchenzema 300Nyandira 400Bumu 100

Total 1280

Except for the very first performance we did for ruralfarmers at a workshop at the UMADEP training centre in themountains, in all the others we distributed seedlings. Atthe second performance we just announced we had seedlings tooffer and were so crowded, that we adopted a method ofgiving seedlings to those who came up with brilliant answersduring the post performance discussions. We alsospecifically sought out young people, including those inprimary school to encourage them to develop the habit oftree planting. During the six performances we distributed600 seedlings of which 150 went to young people below 15years of age. Two hundred of the seedlings were of endemictrees.

With regard to the themes of the performance, they werequite easily identified:a) the necessity and importance of planting treesb) the importance of trees for the environment c) the hazards of firesd) the importance of protecting water sourcese) the need for everyone to plant at least one treef) the stupidly of jealous destruction of other people's

tree plantation, when one can plant their owng) the importance of trees as sources of medicine h) the problems of not working hard, especially among the

youths, to improve oneselfi) the need for grassroots education and mobilization for

tree plantingj) the need for improved energy technology so that they

can use less fuel to produce sufficient energyk) The importance of listening to advice from experts on

trees l) The need to develop a culture of loving, respecting and

protecting our environment

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m) The special importance of endemic tressn) the need for everyone to be a "guard" for the

environment if anyone sees someone for example startinga fire, to report them

o) Recognition that tree planting need not be essentially aland issue one can plant up to 10 trees around thehouse, and about the same around his "shamba"

p) Recognition that tree planting is an individual matter,and not one for waiting for the government to come anddemonstrate, as the direct and main beneficially of atree is the individual

q) The efficiency of arts to demonstrate the importance oftrees

r) The importance of a "MAN" to satisfy personally suchbasic requirements for his household such as firewood,trees for building and so on.

s) The need to train children about the importance ofprotecting the environment, by encouraging them to planttheir own trees.

The above are extractions from the answers given duringthe post performance discussions. Three things provided uswith encouragement. First was the near unanimity that theywould plant at least a few trees round their houses andshamba, thus abandoning the excuse of there beinginsufficient land. Second was the recognition that forestdestruction destroys the environment within which they live,and third was the recognition that endemic trees wereimportant not only for cultural rituals and medicine butmore so for "pulling water" up in the mountains.

A couple more things that were quite positive were theway people tried hard to win seedlings by answeringquestions during the discussions and the way they came tothe researchers after the performance to appeal for at leastone seedling.

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For us also it was quite satisfying to see how theaudiences received the performance, laughing, and showingclear interest in what was going on. In the performances,which we attended, rarely anyone left during theperformance, which lasted 11/4 hours.

d) Results from follow up visitsThe first follow up visit was months later, and the

main purpose of the visit was to try and see whether thosewho had taken trees were looking after them properly. Itwas aimed at seeing whether the group was still intact andcontinuing with performances. Due to the logisticalproblems of travelling, (it is very mountainous and vehiclescan only reach a few villages) it was only possible to meetwith only ten people who had taken trees, in addition tothose taken by artists in Nyandira. We also receivedreports from the artists about continued reaction to theirperformances, and also about those they had given trees. Wehad also planted some trees around the site of thedispensary as part of a community act, and we wanted to seehow they were faring as they did not belong to anyindividual but needed watching as well.

Results from this visit were very positive. The groupwas still intact and performing. Many other villages in themountains had requested for their performance and they hadin fact had repeat performance in two villages. The problemstill was the logistics of carrying seedling to performingareas including even their own props, as they had to walk tothose areas (we had left them with an offer of 200seedlings)

With regard to the trees belonging to the ten people,they were doing quite well. They had received a total of 42seedlings and 39 were growing quite well, two had beennibbed by a goat and only one had "died" Two of those tenhad added five seedling each around the edges of theirshamba. In fact when they saw us they were quite excitedhoping we had gone to provide more seedlings.

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The actors had each been given 10 seedlings and anextra five for the lead performers (6). They too reportedtheir seedlings to be doing well. An interesting phenomenonhad occurred in that one of them had his endemic seedlingsstolen, and in fact reported one more person whose endemicseedlings had been stolen as well. While this wasunfortunate, it implied to us that there was a renewedinterest in endemic tress.

Another interesting development among the artists wastheir wanting to start their own seedbeds, both as an incomegenerator as well as a source of seedlings, as they reportedincreasing inquiries about how to procure seedlings. Theperformers come from two villages, Nyandira and Tchenzema,and they had agreed they would start two seedbeds one foreach village.

The third follow-up visit was in November 1999. Thegroup had began to lose momentum in part because while theyworked hard to perform, no one had taken any otherparticular interest in them after our training and initialperformances. They had continued to perform though and thatyear they had performed 17 times, and had an invitation togo to the adjacent division but had lacked transport.

The research assistant who went up the mountains spentthree days with them trying to rejuvenate their spirits,including doing some rehearsals with them.

With regard to the seedbeds, they both had a total of20,000 seedlings, although they had not had much successwith the endemic trees of the mountains. As to theseedlings distributed (over 1000) most of them were doingwell. Again it was not possible to visit those who hadtaken them because of the logistics of travel mentionedbefore. We relied on the reports from the actors who we hadasked during the stay to inquire about the fate of theseedlings. For some of the respondents, they were their

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neighbors and acquaintances and they had direct access toinformation about the progress of their tress.

One other source of information was from someone whoruns a seedbed as a business. He told us that since ourperformance had begun, there had been an increase in peoplecoming to buy seedlings from his seedbed. While interestwas still in exotic trees, 1970 endemic trees had been takenas well, some individuals taking as many as 100, 50 at ago.According to him, there had been a heightened interest intree planting up in the mountains.

We went to the mountains again in June 2000. Althoughthe purpose this time was to do a documentary on the theatregroup, we learnt that the seedbeds belonging to the groupwere doing quite well, although the proprietors lacked suchthings as polythene bags, and tools for proper uprooting ofseedlings.

The trees belonging to the artists and their neighborswere doing quite well, and when we visited the farms as partof the documentary making we saw for our selves that therewere a lot of young trees around the edges of farms, as wellas round the houses, trees which could not be more than ayear old. In an Interview with the local councilor for thedocumentary, he pointed out that 60,000 trees had beenplanted in the ward in the previous 2 years, thanks he saidto the groups sensitization. Apparently the seed for treeplanting may have been planted.

VI) Discussion of the ResultsThe apparent success reported in this research

therefore is not a unique achievement for theatre but afurther demonstration of its possibilities Unfortunatelytheatre cannot succeed in isolation of other factors aimedat solving social issues.

For example, the performers reported an absence ofencouragement from any other source, despite the fact that

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they were getting a clear message out about the importanceof planting trees. In fact when it appeared they were doingsomething that interested that community and was an areathat donors could fund, one local leader tried to start aparallel group to do exactly the same thing by even tryingto entice some of the members to join the new group.

Another issue worth raising is the nature of suchresearch projects, which are funded minimally and with noopportunity whatsoever of modifying the funding structureeven if one is getting good results. In the proposal werehad suggested 1000 seedlings. As enthusiasm for theseedlings grew we could in no way exceed this ceiling butworse still in some of the areas where access was difficultwe could not "carry" any seedlings to the places. Thishowever is a problem of all projects and not unique to thisone and it is a problem whose solution may not be easy atall. However it maybe important that where projects aresuccessful mechanisms for follow up be facilitated.

For example it would be interesting giving a new leaseof life to this group for another 30 or forty performances,with modified messages based on what is happening now intheir communities. But equally important would be totransfer the apparent success of such projects to otherareas where the problem exists. Places like Dodoma, Songea,Mbeya, Arusha, Kilimanjaro are good candidates for furtherexperimentation.

The apparent lack of clear policy vis-a vis which treesto plant needs urgent attention. It is all very well totalk of “if you cut a tree plant another one”, but which tree? Ourwork centered around the need for an individual to plant thetrees he/she needs for his/her direct satisfaction in suchareas as firewood, building, rituals, medicine, and even forcommercial purposes. We identified likely places where suchtrees could be planted around the house and on edges of thefarms. This seems to have caught their imagination, as itwould not reduce the meager land available for growing

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survival crops. And the trees planted were not anyanonymous trees, but trees of their choice.

Another area that deserves further attention is therole of endemic trees. In the mountains there was a Mr.Kilinyangwa, a peasant, who has taken it upon himself tocollect and catalogue 150 endemic trees to the mountains.Such an individual should be seen as a national hero. Yetno one seems to pay any apparent attention to his work, andeven when the Union President visited the mountains they didnot use one of his seedlings. His handing it overpersonally to the President, which would have emphasized andhighlighted his role in preserving the endemic trees wouldhave been a great eye opener. If such a man were to die, noone else has his skills or abilities. Hence while we talkof protecting sources of water up in the mountains, thisused to be done efficiently by endemic trees. Mr.Kulinyangwa knows about this, collects these trees yet hiswork goes largely unnoticed.

With regard to policy issues, it is important thatauthorities produce policy guidelines for the nature of thiswork (protecting the environment). As the District WaterEngineer said, water levels are influenced by forest cover,but forest supervision is under a different office. Hecannot make a decision on how to deal with forests thatwould influence his water levels. He would need theforestry people to do so, and they may not see the problemin the same way he does. Likewise economists seeking forways to reduce poverty may be interested in continuedexploitation of forest products, while nutritionists maywant more and more vegetables from the mountains. Who thenshould do what and when becomes important. Anotheraccusation leveled at officials however is that they havelacked creative and innovative approaches to solving suchproblems, preferring to rely on technical manuals andgeneric procedures.

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Finally those working in policy initiation anddevelopment work will need to find a way whereby thepolicies and/or development initiatives come from thegrassroots, and are area specific rather than generic.While it is important to have general theory about thenature of things, theory in this case becomes like thestraight-line in a scatter gram, with each point havingindividual specifications. The tendency for developmentinitiatives has generally been that of those who know andare even sympathetic to the problems of those who need to bedeveloped, "helping" them to develop themselves. It may betime to start from the bottom and balance it with theapproach of those who know.

VII Conclusions and RecommendationThe work done in Mgetta indicates that it is actually

possible to have people do something about their destiny.This however was an isolated issue in one community: Treeplanting. While the 60,000 trees said to have been plantedin the two years of this work indicate success of theapproach, it is important that this work be done in otherareas with similar problems in order to increase thevalidity of the approach, so that we can be more certainthat things did not happen by chance, particularly as it wasnot possible to isolate any other factors that could havebeen at work. So far one can tentatively say that theatrecan actually be a good conduit for social mobilizationespecially if it starts and is carried forward by thepeople themselves.

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