The Road to Ruin: Forty-mile road proposed through the Serengeti

 

A forty-mile road that will cross the northern end of the Serengeti and pass through the largest wildlife migratory corridor on the planet was proposed by the Tanzanian government in 2010. The government, wooed by Gala Group Ltd. and other smaller mining companies, is convinced that the highway will facilitate commercial traffic and promote tourism in Tanzania. President Jakaya Kikwete has fervently defended his support of the proposed highway despite the predicted outcome: collapse of the world's greatest existing migratory system.

Environmentalists, conservation groups, scientists, lawyers, and even the travel industry are working together in an attempt to cease construction of this destructive road. The African Network for Animal Welfare (ANAW) has requested an injunction to stop the proposal. Lawyers Environmental Action Team (LEAT) is lobbying against the highway. Jane Goodall, who has spent a significant part of her life in Tanzania, has personally implored Kikwete to seek an alternate southern route, even offering to campaign internationally for donations to build a southern highway. A southern route is feasible and is actually less expensive, but would circumvent Lake Victoria, an area rich in rare metals. Metals that we need for cell phones and laptop computers. Metals that China buys up as quickly as they can be mined from the Serengeti Plain.

Devastating deforestation of the Amazon Rainforest began with a road that allowed loggers, miners and ranchers to invade the pristine land; spewing pollution, spreading disease, trampling flora and fauna, butchering wildlife, and destroying cultures. Trees were cut down, wildlife habitats were fractured, a flawless ecosystem shattered, and indigenous people were forced off their land.  Sound familiar? It should. It happened on the Great Plains of America in the 1800s when millions of buffalo and thousands of Lakota co-existed in an ecologically sound relationship until a railroad was built to link the Eastern states with the West to access its promise of land and gold. Of course, I wasn't a witness to the rape of the plains, but my Lakota ancestors were.

The buffalo and some Indian tribes came close to extinction in the 1800s, and now, the wildebeest, elephant, zebra, and aboriginal people of Africa are faced with the same threat if the Arusha-Musoma highway is built. History repeats itself as with the Great Plains and the Amazon. Roads are constructed in the name of progress and progress is often a disguise for greed. China wants the metal coltan from Tanzania and the world wants cell phones and laptops from China. Computers and cell phones are no longer a luxury but a necessity in our busy technological world and boycotting them is not likely, but promoting and encouraging a southern highway that bypasses the Serengeti is a realistic alternative.

SavetheSerengeti.org is a permanent nonprofit organization opposing the commercial highway. It is a valid conservation organization. Please visit their website and support their efforts. There is not much time left. The road is being surveyed right now and construction will begin in 2012.