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CHAPTER ELEVEN POSTSCRIPT: TANZANIA IN TRANSITION – SUMMARY AND TRENDS 2005 – 20101 Kjell Havnevik This book describes and analyses transitions in Tanzania related to the agrarian sector (chapters 4, 5 and 6), forestry (chapter 7), development cooperation (chapter 9) and governance and democratization (chapters 8 and 10) with emphasis on the Mkapa era. All the areas analysed in the book are critical for Tanzanian development. The majority of the population in rural areas, development assistance is dominant for the country’s development activities and democratization aims at promoting agency so that people can influence their own lives and livelihoods, i.e. exercise their freedoms. The attempts to promote transitions both during the Mkapa era and beyond, however, rest on a legacy of colonialism and more than three decades of one-party state rule. The understanding of this legacy is outlined in the historical parts of the book (chapters 2, 3 and partly chapter 4) and with particular attention to the role and influence of Julius Nyerere, president of Tanzania from 1961 to 1985, and later given the official title, “Father of the Nation”. In addition, the context of transitions in Tanzania has, since the mid-1980s, been embedded in the process of economic liberalization (Shivji, 2006), pushed by International Financial Institutions and gradually embraced by the Tanzanian governments. Thus the outcomes of Tanzanian transitions are connected with both domestic and external strategies and processes of change. Agrarian Transitions and Growth Performance As to the agrarian transitions analysed, certain dynamics have been identified in the research presented in this book. In particular expanding urbanlike rural settlements, wealth accumulation and class differentiation are emerging and capitalist investors are taking a stronger grip on land and use of wage labour (Katoro-Buseresere in the north) (chapter 4). However, findings from rural settings show that land policies aimed at agrarian transitions are unable to challenge the customary land ownership systems (Njombe and Maswa districts in the south-west and north/central). The customary system prevails with only a slow movement in the direction of 1 I am grateful for constructive comments on this postscript by Jonas Ewald and Mats Hårsmar. 266 Chapter Eleven land markets until the mid-2000s (chapter 6). In all cases agrarian forms of livelihood are foundational to material and cultural security although economic diversification has been spread and intensified during recent decades. The continued reliance on customary ownership systems may reflect a sense of insecurity or uncertainty as regards rural people’s trust in formal institutions, including those related to individual land titling. Many rural informants stated that privatization of land would lead to landlessness and poverty. As well rural diversification can be seen as a way for smallholders to spread risk or to counter uncertainty and to withdraw from state controlled agricultural marketing systems. Economic diversification into extra-agricultural activities, including trading, handicrafts, forestry, fishing etc, emerged on a larger scale in Tanzania in connection with economic stagnation during the 1970s and has intensified since, including rural-urban migration (Ellis, 1983, Maliyankono and Bagachwa, 1990, Havnevik, 1993, Havnevik and Hårsmar, 1999 and Bryceson, 2000). The diminishing role of agriculture as an income earner in sub-Saharan Africa today, and a manifestation of rural dynamics, is reflected in that more than 50% of rural incomes are extra-agricultural (Havnevik et al, 2007). More recent empirical studies have conceptualized rural dynamics in terms of vulnerability defined as the likelihood of experiencing future loss of welfare, weighted by the magnitude of expected welfare loss. The level of vulnerability is connected with the characteristics of the risk and the capacity of the household to respond to it through various risk management strategies. Household vulnerability could be conceptualized as existing of several components, including (i) uncertain events, (ii) the possibilities for managing risks or risk responses and (iii) the outcome in terms of welfare losses. A recent study by Sarris and Karfakis (2007) focusing on Kilimanjaro (north) and Ruvuma (south-west) regions shows that vulnerability in the rural regions of Tanzania is quite high and considerably higher in poor (Ruvuma) as compared to more well off regions (Kilimanjaro). However, vulnerability as well appears to differ considerably among different areas within Kilimanjaro as well as in Ruvuma. Differences in vulnerability were found to be much higher in Kilimanjaro region in spite of this region being the better off region (Sarris and Karfakis, 2007). Recent developments connected with the external or global context may have added to the vulnerability of smallholders in Tanzania and other...

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