Straddling the Great Rift Valley, in the southern western regions of Rukwa and Mbeya, is a small lake called Rukwa.
Some twenty years ago, the lake was famous for fish which not only reached the southern regions of Tanzania but also found their way as far as Zambia and the then Southern Rhodesia where individual businessmen used to send thousands of tonnes of smoked fish harvested from the lake.
During those days, fleets of lorries from different corners of the country and Zambia frequented the small lake which covers some 3,000 sq kilometres. The trucks carried bundles of dried and smoked tilapia, locally known as “nsasara” to the indigenous people living around the Lake.
Today, however, the once famous source of nutritious food to hundreds of mouths in the two regions and the neighbouring countries, has turned into a dreadful asylum of over-bred crocodiles.
A report of the Directorate of Fishing, covering ten years (1972 to 1982) points an accusing finger on the estimated 10,000 crocodiles in the Lake as a major cause behind a sharp decline of fish in the lake.
The report says that every crocodile in the lake is consuming an average of ten kilos of fish a day. This has led to a decline in fish catches from 6,613 tonnes of fish in 1972 to merely 22 tonnes in 1979.
Although the Tanzanian Fisheries Research Institute (TAFIRI) has not yet conducted any research on the small lake for lack of personnel, equipment and funds, recently a group of students from the Serengeti Wildlife Institute made an initial survey of the lake after receiving financial support from the Directorate of Wildlife. A spokesman for the Tanzania Wildlife Corporation (TAWICO) is convinced that Lake Rukwa has abundant reptiles because out of 10,000 crocodiles last cropped by his corporation in 1977, half of them were killed from Lake Rukwa. For the past three years the government has been declaring its intention to decrease the number of crocodiles in the country.
The Director for Wildlife in the Ministry of Lands, Natural Resources and Tourism, Fred Lwezaula was quoted two years ago as saying Tanzania was intending to request the secretariat of the Convention on International Trade on Endangered Species of fauna and flora (CITES) for their permission to crop the reptiles.
Tanzania as signatory to CITES is not allowed to kill the reptiles and other endangered species until a permission to that effect is granted by CITES. Crocodiles, leopards, rhino and cheetahs are considered by CITES as animals on the verge of extinction and hence are protected under the CITES convention.
CITES says Western taste for crocodile hides which are needed for the manufacture of such things like suitcases and watch bands has put 18 out of the world’s 21 species of crocodiles under the first group of endangered species. Paradoxically fishermen along Lake Rukwa have become among the casualties of CITES.
Although TAWICO is eager to crop the reptiles and sell their hides to its traditional markets of Japan and Western Europe CITES is not happy about the whole idea.
The Director of Wildlife, however, maintains that crocodiles are not on the list of endangered species in Tanzania and sees no point why CITES should continue to deny the country the opportunity to trade in crocodile hides – a lucrative business in countries like Zimbabwe and Papua New Guinea, both CITES signatories.
However, if eventually, Tanzania gets a CITES permit to reduce the number of crocodiles in Lake Rukwa and other places, the country is likely to get millions of money in foreign currency since the country’s traditional markets in Western Europe are still wide open for more hides from the reptiles.
Joseph Kithama, Shihata