By Farzad Ghotaslou – Art in Tanzania, Internship Project
N’Gorongoro is a weekly destination for Art in Tanzania safari participants. The world-famous crater is part of the Serengeti safari and is also a destination on its own, combined with visits to Tarangire and Lake Manyara National Parks.
Ngorongoro Conservation Area is a national conservation area in the Arusha region of northern Tanzania, southeast of Serengeti National Park. It occupies some 3,200 square miles (8,300 square km) and extends over part of the Eastern (Great) Rift Valley of eastern Africa. It contains a variety of habitats and landscapes, including grassland plains, savanna woodlands, forests, mountains, volcanic craters, lakes, rivers, and swampland.
The park’s most prominent feature is Ngorongoro Crater, one of the world’s largest unbroken calderas. Also located are the major archaeological sites of Olduvai Gorge and Laetolil, where hominin remains dating from 2.1 million and 3.6 million years ago were found, respectively.
The area’s main volcanic formations, including Ngorongoro Crater, Olmoti, and Empakaai, formed 20 million to 2 million years ago. Empakaai Crater is noted for the deep soda lake occupying nearly half its caldera floor.
Ngorongoro Conservation Area hosts the largest ungulate herds in the world, including gnu (wildebeests), plains zebras, and Thomson’s and Grant’s gazelles. Predatory animals include lions, spotted hyenas, leopards, and cheetahs. The endangered black rhinoceros and African hunting dog can also be found there. Notable among more than 400 species of birds in the area are flamingos, silvery-cheeked hornbills, superb starlings, and bronze and tacazze sunbirds.
Ngorongoro was added to the UNESCO World Heritage List in 1979. Although cultivation is not permitted within the area, some 25,000 to 40,000 Masai are allowed to graze their livestock there. Issues of concern during the latter part of the 20th century were the damage to the ecosystem caused by overgrazing and tourism vehicles and the diminishing of black rhinoceros, leopard, and elephant populations because of poaching.
The Ngorongoro Conservation Area spans vast expanses of highland plains, savanna, savanna woodlands, and forests, from the plains of the Serengeti National Park in the northwest to the eastern arm of the Great Rift Valley. The area was established in 1959 as a multiple-use area, with wildlife coexisting with semi-nomadic Maasai pastoralists practising traditional livestock grazing.
It includes the spectacular Ngorongoro Crater, the world’s largest caldera, and Olduvai Gorge, a 14km deep ravine. The property has global importance for biodiversity conservation because of the presence of globally threatened species such as the black Rhino, the density of wildlife inhabiting the Ngorongoro Crater and surrounding areas throughout the year, and the annual migration of wildebeest, zebra, Thompson’s and Grant’s gazelles and other ungulates into the northern plains.
The area has been subject to extensive archaeological research for over 80 years, yielding a long sequence of evidence of human evolution and human-environment dynamics, collectively extending over a span of almost four million years to the early modern era.
This evidence includes fossilized footprints at Laetoli, associated with the development of human bipedalism, a sequence of diverse, evolving hominin species within Olduvai gorge, which range from Australopiths such as Zinjanthropus boisei to the Homo lineage that includes Homo habilis, Homo erectus and Homo sapiens; an early form of Homo sapiens at Lake Ndutu; and, in the Ngorongoro crater, remains that document the development of stone technology and the transition to the use of iron.
The overall landscape of the area has the potential to reveal much more evidence concerning the rise of anatomically modern humans, modern behaviour, and human ecology.
The Area has yielded an exceptionally long sequence of crucial evidence related to human evolution and human-environment dynamics, collectively extending from four million years ago to the beginning of this era. This includes physical evidence of the most important benchmarks in human evolutionary development.
Although the interpretation of many of the assemblages of Olduvai Gorge is still debatable, their extent and density are remarkable. Several of the type fossils in the hominin lineage come from this site. Furthermore, future research in the property will likely reveal much more evidence concerning the rise of anatomically modern humans, modern behaviour, and human ecology.
The stunning landscape of Ngorongoro Crater, combined with its spectacular concentration of wildlife, is one of the greatest natural wonders of the planet. Spectacular wildebeest numbers (well over 1 million animals) pass through the property as part of the annual migration of wildebeest across the Serengeti ecosystem and calve in the short grass plains that straddle the Ngorongoro Conservation Area/Serengeti National Park boundary. This constitutes a truly superb natural phenomenon.
Ngorongoro crater is the largest unbroken caldera in the world. Together with the Olmoti and Empakaai craters, it is part of the eastern Rift Valley, whose volcanism dates back to the late Mesozoic / early Tertiary periods and is famous for its geology. The property also includes Laetoli and Olduvai Gorge, which contain an important palaeontological record of human evolution.
Variations in climate, landforms, and altitude have resulted in several overlapping ecosystems and distinct habitats, including short grass plains, highland catchment forests, savanna woodlands, montane long grass plains, and high open moorlands. The property is part of the Serengeti ecosystem, one of the last intact ecosystems in the world, which harbours large and spectacular animal migrations.
In relation to natural values, the property’s grasslands and woodlands support very large animal populations, largely undisturbed by cultivation at the time of inscription. The property’s wide-ranging landscapes were not impacted by development or permanent agriculture at the time of inscription.
The property’s integrity is also enhanced by its location in the Serengeti-Mara ecosystem. It adjoins Serengeti National Park (1,476,300 ha), which is also included on the World Heritage List as a natural property. Connectivity within and between these properties and adjoining landscapes through functioning wildlife corridors is essential to protecting the integrity of animal migrations.
No hunting is permitted in the Ngorongoro Conservation Area (NCA), but wildlife poaching is a continuing threat requiring effective patrolling and enforcement capacity. Invasive species are a source of ongoing concern, requiring continued monitoring and effective action if detected.
Tourism pressure is also of concern, including the potential impacts from increased visitation, new infrastructure, traffic, waste management, disturbance to wildlife, and the potential introduction of invasive species.
The property provides grazing land for semi-nomadic Maasai pastoralists. At the time of inscription, an estimated 20,000 Maasai lived on the property, with some 275,000 head of livestock, which was considered within the reserve’s capacity.
No permanent agriculture is officially allowed on the property. The Maasai population and cattle numbers should remain within the property’s capacity. However, increasing decentralization, local overgrazing, and agricultural encroachment threaten the property’s natural and cultural values.
There were no inhabitants in Ngorongoro and Empaakai Craters or the forest at the time of inscription in 1979.
The property encompasses the known archaeological remains and areas of high archaeo-anthropological potential where related finds might be made. However, the integrity of specific paleo-archaeological attributes and the overall sensitive landscape are, to an extent, under threat and thus vulnerable due to the lack of enforcement of protection arrangements related to grazing regimes and from proposed access and tourist-related developments at Laetoli and Olduvai Gorge.
The Ngorongoro Conservation Area Ordinance of 1959 is the primary legislation protecting the property. The property is managed by the Ngorongoro Conservation Area Authority (NCAA). The Division of Antiquities is responsible for managing and protecting the paleo-anthropological resources within the Ngorongoro Conservation Area. A memorandum of understanding should be established and maintained to formalize relations between the two entities.
A General Management Plan guides property management. Currently, the primary management objectives are to conserve the property’s natural resources, protect the interests of the Maasai pastoralists, and promote tourism.
The management system and the Management Plan need to be widened to encompass an integrated cultural and natural approach, bringing together ecosystem needs with cultural objectives to achieve a sustainable approach to conserving the property’s Outstanding Universal Value, including the management of grasslands and the archaeological resource, and to promote environmental and cultural awareness.
The Plan needs to extend the management of cultural attributes beyond social issues and the resolution of human-wildlife conflicts to the documentation, conservation, and management of cultural resources and the investigation of the wider landscape’s potential in archaeological terms.
Vehicle access to the crater and other popular areas of the property requires clear limits to protect the quality of the experience and ensure natural and cultural attributes are not unduly disturbed. Developments and infrastructure for tourism or property management that impinges on its natural and cultural attributes should not be permitted.
Considering the property’s important natural relationship to adjoining reserves, it is important to establish effective and continuing collaboration between the property, Serengeti National Park, and other areas of the Serengeti-Mara ecosystem to assure connectivity for wildlife migrations and harmonize management objectives regarding tourism use, landscape management, and sustainable development.
References:
1.Wikiepedia
2.TripAdvisor
3.Britanica
4.Unesco official website
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