New visitor center outside Serengeti to boost tourism activities

The Ikona Wildlife Management Area, of which the Singita Grumeti Reserve is part, has now formally commissioned a new visitor center, from which the entire area, dedicated to wildlife conservation, is to benefit. The center was funded with support of the Frankfurt Zoological Society, the United States government and the World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF). It has also received assistance from the tourism businesses located in the Wildlife Management Area (WMA), itself now a pioneer in community tourism programs. Training of locals is also important part of the new center, that will provide much needed skills to the people from the area, instead of ‘importing’ staff from other parts of Tanzania.

WMA ia a new approach to encouraging local communities to partner with investors and set aside land not overly productive in agriculture or ranching for wildlife conservation, aimed to create buffer zones for added protection of the main national parks and game reserves, but also to spread economic benefits like jobs and tourism related income into villages which have previously been bypassed and ignored. Good conservation news from Tanzania, well worth applauding and making more widely known.