CONFLICTS AND NATURAL

RESOURCES
Mwakipesile A.
 Introduction
• Conflict is a form of competitive behaviour
between people or groups.
• It occurs when two or more parties compete over
perceived or actual incompatible goals or limited
resources (TCCR, 1998:2).
• Conflict is an expressed struggle between at least
two interdependent parties who perceived
incompatible goals, scarce resources, and
interference from the other part in achieving
their goals.
 Introduction cont…
• Conflict is understood as a situation in which
human beings are exposed to or involved in a
number of tensions that may or may not erupt
into violent conflict.
• Conflict is an intense experience in breakdown
in communication and interaction with
transformative potential.
 Introduction cont…
• Conflict is a complex and multi-dimensional
phenomena, consisting principally of the
combination of a situation of incompatible
goals, a range of psychological conditions
experienced by the parties, and a set of
related behaviors used to achieve the
disputed goals (Jones, 2003:2).
 Introduction cont…
• Natural resource use conflicts refer to disputes
between and among different NR users and
other NR use stakeholders in a certain
location.
• These conflicts have ranged from individuals,
to households, clans, villages, private
institutions, public institutions, miners (artisan
miners versus large scale miners).
 Introduction cont…
• Resource scarcity often generates conflicts
between different resource users such as
between pastoralists and peasants, between
modern agrarian activities and mining, and so
on.
 Introduction cont…
• Eastern Africa is a conflict-ridden region.
• These conflicts range from inter-state
conflicts, such as the Ethiopian–Eritrean
conflict, civil wars such as in the Sudan,
northern Uganda and the former Republic of
Somalia, to localised conflicts.
• In many cases the increasingly shrinking
resource base is one of the factors giving rise
to, or aggravating, these conflicts.
• NR PLAN.&MGT\NR Conflicts\Basutu land.doc
 The pattern of NR conflicts
• Property regimes i.e. common (tragedy of the
commons), public/state owned , private lands,
open access NRs
• Types of NR use conflicts
• Interest conflict e.g. compatible interest
between farmers versus pastoralist
• Value conflict e.g. the benefit of watershed
utilization and management between upstream
users and down stream users
The pattern of NR conflicts cont…
• Cognitive conflict e.g. different perceptions
towards land resources like community
perception of a forest land as resource,
ownership and access of clan/tribe lands by
others
• Behavioral conflict i.e. attitudes and
information gap
 Causes of NR use conflicts
• Inadequate coordination /Conflicting
policies
• High population growth rate
• Tribal/clan ties (unequal distribution of
land)
• Resources have multiple uses
• Low participation in LUP
Causes of NR use conflicts cont…
• Limited fertile lands (Globally only 10% of
lands is arable i.e. leading to high demand)
• Colonial land use plans that created high
concentration of people and economic
activities in specific places leading to
greater competition of land
• Limited open access resources like land and
Water (scarcity)
• Haphazard selling of land in villages
 Causes of NR use conflicts cont…
• Lack of land use plan
• Political ecology
• Power relations (access to NRs e.g. fertile land)
• Climate change and variability

• What do you think the root causes of NR use

conflicts in Loliondo and Mtwara or elsewhere
 Conflict management and resolution
• The Courts (Land Disputes Settlements) Act,
2002: refer to the Act
• Wildlife Act 2009 and its Regulations
• Forest Act and regulations
• TANAPA Act
• Village Land regulations 2001
• Village land Act 1999
• Land Act 1999 (PART XIII DISPUTE SETTLEMENT-
section 167: Establishment of Land Courts).
 Conflict management and resolution
cont..
• The need for participatory village land use planning
and administration. This will ensure the following:
– To prepare a village land-use management plan
with villagers considering public as well as
individual interests.
– To solve land use conflicts in public and private
lands
– To agree about, and if necessary to demarcate,
survey and register land for community facilities as
well as village public lands
Conflict management and resolution
cont..
– To agree about and if required, demarcate, survey
and register private lands
– To establish a village land registry
– If required to formulate by-laws to enforce various
land use agreements in the village
 Conflict management and resolution
cont..
• Legal pluralism (removal of inequalities between
statutory and customary rights over land)
• Local institutions to have land rights officers
• In Usangu agricultural and pastoral families are
networked through labor exchange, intermarriage
as well as church and club membership
• Proclamation of gender equality in relation to land
 Management of Conflicts
• How to deal with a NR use conflict depends
first of all on the current stage of its process.
• That is, depending on the stage of the conflict,
the emphasis chosen to assist in its resolution
may be more on crisis prevention,
peacemaking, peacekeeping or peace
building, each of which requires different tools
and different methods of conflict resolution
Management of Conflicts cont…
 Consensual approaches
• Consensual approaches are those conflict resolution
strategies which aim to find a compromise that is
acceptable to all parties involved and which can best
re-establish peace, respect and even friendship
among the parties.
• Consensual approaches therefore try to find a
consensus among the conflict parties through
intensive discussions and negotiations, during which
all sides learn to understand the other party’s/
parties’ interests, motivations, (hurt) feelings and
eventually even their fears and desires.
 Forms of conflict resolution
• Facilitation: The facilitator helps the parties come
together, the parties still being able to solve the
problem by themselves. Facilitation can be applied in
a very early stage of pre-conflict to defuse the
conflict in time and avoid escalation.
• Moderation: The moderator helps the parties come
together to clarify and settle minor differences, the
parties still being able to solve the problem by
themselves. Moderation can be applied in a pre-
conflict situation to defuse the conflict in time and
avoid escalation.
Forms of conflict resolution cont…
• Consultation: The “tutor” accompanies the process,
working on the deeply internalised perceptions,
attitudes, intentions and behaviours of the parties in
order to calm them.
• Consultation is yet another approach useful during
the stage of pre-conflict to stop the conflict
progressing toward becoming a full-blown crisis.
• It is more appropriate than simple moderation in a
case where a latent conflict has manifested itself for
a longer time and has already created prejudices and
hostility.
Forms of conflict resolution cont…
• Socio-therapeutic consultation: This special form of
consultation focuses explicitly on destructive,
dysfunctional or neurotic behaviour due to
psychological damages caused by former negative
experiences in life.
• Socio-therapeutic consultation is extremely helpful if
the parties involved have already lost face during the
processes of peacemaking, peacekeeping and peace
building, as it helps in the understanding of one own
behavior as well as that of one’s opponent, and
therefore creates understanding and a willingness to
forgive one another.
Forms of conflict resolution cont…
• Conciliation: This is a mixture of consultation and
mediation. The conciliator helps the parties to
negotiate while – whenever necessary – addressing
internalised perceptions, attitudes, intentions and
behaviours with the objective of reducing prejudices
and hostility. Conciliation can be applied in pre-
conflict and early conflict situations as long as the
parties are able to talk to each other.
 Forms of conflict resolution cont…
• Mediation: Mediation, too, requires that the parties are
willing to face each other and to find a compromise. The
mediator follows a strict procedure, giving each party
the opportunity to explain its perceptions and to express
its feelings, forcing the other party to listen and finally
moderating a discussion aimed at finding a solution with
which both parties can live. Preferably, the moderator
should not propose solutions but may lead the way
towards them. At the end, a written contract is signed by
all parties and the mediator seals the agreement.
Mediation can be done in any situation as long as the
parties are willing to find a compromise.
Forms of conflict resolution cont…
• Arbitration: Arbitration follows strict rules too.
Unlike the moderator, however, the arbitrator is
expected to make direct suggestions on how to settle
the conflict. He is more influential and powerful than
moderators, tutors or mediators. He has decision-
making authority. Therefore, arbitration can be used
even at the peak of a conflict. What makes it
different from adjudication is that the arbitrators are
accepted and trusted by both parties. The arbitrator
may be appointed by all conflicting parties or be a
respected person traditionally responsible for
dispute settlement.
Forms of conflict resolution cont…
• Decision by a powerful authority
(adjudication) should always remain the last
resort.
 Non-consensual approaches
• Non-consensual approaches are characterized
by third party decision making.
• There is much less diversity in non-consensual
approaches than there is in consensual
approaches
 Non-consensual approaches
cont…
• Adjudication is a formal litigation process. The
decision-maker is a judge at a regular court, a
specialized land court or a tribunal. The process
follows formal procedures and rules
• An alternative to adjudication is arbitration, which is
more flexible, much quicker and generally less
expensive, especially in smaller cases in which no
lawyers are involved. It also allows for much better
conciliation, as the arbitrator can also act as a
mediator, the only difference being that s/he has the
last say in the matter.
 Non-consensual approaches
cont…
• Customary land dispute resolution
• Religiously based land conflict resolution
• Land dispute resolution bodies
Oloipiri village - Loliondo
Enguserosambu-Loliondo near Kenya
border
Ololosokwan and Soitsambu
 WATER CONFLICTS MANAGEMENT
THROUGH TRADITIONAL INSTITUTIONS

The case of Pangani Basin

 TYPES OF CONFLICTS
• CONFLICTS WITHIN COMMUNITY OVER ACCESS RIGHTS-

farmer –farmer conflict

For example
• one farmer takes off water off stream (steals water) for
irrigation therefore impeding the flow of water to the storage
facility for irrigation (water reservoir) or to the tributary
furrow
• A farmer irrigates his/her farm (steals) before his/her turn
• Farmer plants wrong crops that siphon a lot of water or over
plants
• People upstream cuts off water from those downstream
Conflict between conflicting land uses
• Farmer-Pastoralists
• Livestock watering in prohibited areas e.g. in a water
reservoir reserved for irrigation of crops; in irrigation
furrows, irrigated areas, river which feeds into
irrigation facilities thus causing siltation of the
furrows and the reservoirs.
• Farmers cultivating along livestock routes and
construction of buildings along livestock routes
causing livestock to stray into irrigation canal/furrows
• No information on arrival of migrant pastoralists
especially during drought periods.
 ..conflict continues…
Farmers –authorities
• Authorities allocating to themselves irrigation
farmland close to dependable irrigation canals thus
depriving less powerful farmers of water
• Logging of trees along irrigation facilities especially at
source point.
• Wildlife watering in irrigation canals or reservoir
destroying irrigation facilities, causing muddy water
& siltation.
• Wildlife grazing irrigated crops and other vegetation
in irrigated farm areas
 Conflict continues
Farmer-fisher
• Fishing persons blocking canals & unblocking
weirs in order to fish along irrigation canals
 …conflict continues….
Governance
• Corruption-water distributors corrupt taking bribe double
allocates water or favours others not their turns to get water
• Village government not listening to farmer’s complaints
• Revenue collected from use of water not invested in
improving the irrigation system and not banked
• Water user meetings and elections not held on time
• Others not providing self-help labour during cleaning or
maintenance of the irrigation system and nothing is done to
them.
 Conflict Resolution
• Adaptation of traditional norms into the formal
governance system of irrigation furrrows
• The norms involves:
a system of penalties/fines for stealing water, dodging
work, grazing or watering livestock in furrows,
reservoirs or in irrigated farming areas; destroying
furrows, planting wrong crops not participating at
night in chasing away wildlife; attend meetings,
misconduct in management of the water system and
disrespect of traditional norms.
 Conflict case Studies
• Growing of wrong crops-uprooted
• Brick making along irrigation canal by youths
• Watering livestock in a reservoir
• Destruction of crops by wildlife-tolerated
• Watering livestock in a water reservoir-taken care by
the respective ethnic group
• Destruction of crops of one farmer by a pastoralist-
case taken to police station-corruption interfered