Improving Livelihoods and Building Capacity, Tanzania Water Governance

The Coca-Cola Company (TCCC)- U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID)  Water and Development Alliance (WADA) project supported Tanzania’s new water governance strategy in this project that ended in June 2009. It improved community access to sustainable safe water, provided sanitation services to local communities in need, and promoted sustainable management of watershed and water resources in the country’s two most important basins – the Wami-Ruvu and Pangani River Basins.

The project built on existing programs and projects of the USAID Mission in Tanzania and the International Union of the Conservation of Nature in both of these river basins. The project also anticipated the recently approved World Bank Water Sector Support Program, which targeted the Pangani River Basin in years 1 and 2 and the Wami-Ruvu in years 2-3, and included investments in rural water and sanitation, as well as water management.

A statement of the expanded role of The Coca-Cola Company in Africa can be found here.  A statement from the USAID perspective can be found here.

Of the nine river basins in Tanzania, the two with the largest populations dependent on their water resources are the Wami-Ruvu and Pangani River Basins. These river systems are crucial to the public and private sectors and are critical for maintaining biodiversity and managing wildlife parks and marine ecosystems. Each of these basins have experienced environmental degradation from agricultural runoff from intensive sugar, rice, and sisal cultivation; water withdrawals to supply towns and villages; sewage outfalls; increasing use of land for livestock production accompanied by overgrazing; illegal and excessive logging; and charcoal production. The project goals were to:

  1. delineate the drainage basins and characterize the surface catchments in the Wami River
  2. increase the capacity of communities in water supply and sanitation through training and education, appropriate technologies, and strengthened community organizations
  3. improve community access to safe water and sanitation services
  4. promote environmental management systems to reduce wastewater discharges from the agro-industrial sector
  5. conduct an environmental flow assessment of the Wami River Basin; and
  6. strengthen database management systems.

Planned project outcomes included the following:

  • The development and improvement of water supply systems, hygiene education, and sanitation facilities in nine wards within five districts in the Wami-Ruvu and Pangani river basins
  • Strengthened Village Water Committees and the local ownership and management of water supply and sanitation services
  • The identification of best practices in agro-industrial water use and wastewater discharge that improve water flow and quality and reduce business operating costs
  • The identification and prioritization of threats to biodiversity in the two river basins
  • The production of geomorphological profile zones of the Wami River, including surface catchment maps
  • The determination of current and projected water available for allocation to human uses and for ecosystem maintenance in the Wami River BasnThe project will be managed and implemented through USAID/Tanzania’s environment and natural resources management strategic objective and implemented by a partnership involving:
    • Kwanza and Bonite Coca-Cola bottlers in Tanzania
    • World Vision Tanzania
    • Tanzania Health, Environment and Sanitation Association (THESA)
    • Coastal Resources Center at the University of Rhode Island through its Tanzania Coastal Management Partnership (TCMP) program office located in Dar es Salaam
    • Florida International University through its GLOWS program site in the Mara River Basin

    Partners within Tanzania included the U.S. Agency for International Development, the Division of Environment in the Vice President’s Office, the National Environment Management Council, the Ministry of Water, the Ministry for Local Governments, the Wami-Ruvu Basin Water Office, the Pangani River Water Basin Office, District Councils, Village Water Committees, Saadani National Park, and agro-industrial sugar and sisal producers, including the Tanganyika Planting Company and the Mtibwa Sugar factory.