PANGANI BASIN WATER BOARD

C.2 Industrial interests
Probably the largest industrial interest in the Pangani River Basin (PRB) is power generation. The main
supplier in this regard is the state-owned Tanzania Electric Supply Co. [sic.] (TANESCO), which owns
four hydropower facilities on the Pangani River. These are Nyumba ya Mungu (NYM) (with an 8 MW
capacity), Hale (21 MW), and New Pangani Falls (68 MW. All the power plants are connected to the
national grid and they contribute about 17% to the total hydropower production of the country (Ngula,
2002). The firm discharge through the power plants is about 24 m 3 /s, whereas the maximum designed
discharge is 45 m 3 /s. Old Pangani (17.5 MW) operates only occasionally, crippled by lack of adequate
water (Lugeiyamu, pers. comm.).
In the dry season, water shortages may cause power generation within the basin to drop to as low as 32
MW (Sarmett and Kamugisha, 2002).
There are extensive mining interests in the Pangani River Basin. These include tin mining in Korogwe,
tanzanite and phosphate mines in the Arusha Region, and limestone mines in the Tanga Region (Mkuula,
1993). Genstones are also an important quest, and 80% of the world’s known tanzanite reserves are to
be found at Merelani, 100 km northeast of Arusha. Sand mining for building purposes is common along
riverbanks, and in Kenyan parts of the Basin, ruby mining is carried out.
Other industry within the basin is that associated with farming, such as sugar refineries and sisal
processing plants. In Kenya’s Taita – Taveta District, sisal production is the main agricultural activity.
C. 3 Farming interests
The Chagga peoples have lived on Mt. Kilimanjaro’s slopes for between 300 – 450 years. Their farmland
is divided into two types of tenure. The first is ‘shamba’, and is typically restricted to the lower slopes of
the mountain where rainfall is much less reliable, and irrigation commensurately more important. The
use of shamba land was overseen by Chagga chiefs, who would allocate parcels of land to farmers on
a seasonal basis. While a farmer might exploit the land for a long period of time, it was never his to own
(Johnston, 1946). The second type of Chagga land tenure is the ‘kihamba’, which was set aside for the
private use of Chagga denizens. Kihamba was – and still is – farmed with remarkable intensity. Even
in the 1940s, at the time of Johnston’s (1942) writing, there was very little kihamba land left that could
be used as pasture, and most livestock was stall-fed. In those areas where farming intensities became
too high, and no additional kihamba land was available, Chagga chiefs were obliged to convert shamba
land to kihamba. In effect, this gesture served to siphon off excess farming from the upper slopes to the
lower slopes of the mountain. The Chagga could not expand up the mountain because this was already
set aside as forest reserve, and they could not expand into the middle slope areas because this was
‘alienated’ land for European settlers (Lein, 2002).
Against this background of high farming intensity, the Chagga devised furrow systems to deliver water
from natural watercourses to their crops. This system is said to be one of the oldest (thought to have
started in the 18 th Century (Gillingham, 1999)) and most extensive furrowbased irrigation systems in
Africa (Røhr et al. n.d.). To obtain such furrow water, a Chagga had to be a member of a furrow board,
which was governed by furrow elders whose instructions farmers had to follow on pain of fines or
prohibition from using furrow water (Johnston, 1946). Furrow board members were also expected to play
a part in the maintenance of the furrows. Furrow members who abstracted water from furrows owned by
individuals or claims had to pay fees to do so.
Despite the apparent farming intensity and population pressure on kihamba land, traditional institutions of
governance and conflict prevention appear to have been effective. Johnston (1942) commented that “…it is
remarkable that, with a big and complicated furrow system in the kihamba land, so well are matters run by the
furrow elders, that the number of cases arising out of disputes over water rights are relatively few” (p. 4).
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