FACTORS THAT INFLUENCES VEGETATION DISTRIBUTION IN TANZANIA
I’m Kiwale Brasto, Festo. @ 2016
Ruaha Catholic University- Iringa, Tanzania
Published from Kiwale Company Publishers
This handout is here to help all people, therefore all right reserved no one would be allowed to copy, print, or any kind of plagiarism is involved, but read then leave it as it is.
Vegetation
defined as the plants of a particular area which may be very diverse or belong
to just one or a few species, depending on climatic conditions, the nature of
the soil and human activity.
Basically there are two types of vegetation;
Natural
vegetation and artificial vegetation. Natural vegetation is plants that have not
been grown by humans. It doesn’t need help from humans and gets whatever it
needs from its natural environment. Some types of natural vegetation are
forests, tundra, grass lands, woodlands, baobab and ebony and rainforests.
Natural vegetation such as forests can regenerate after a long time which is
called the secondary forest, example (http://grade7geography.wikispaces.com/).
Artificial vegetation are plants which are
planted by man in a particularly area, it differs from natural vegetation in
structure, composition, intensity of management, orderliness and uniformity for
example pines, conifers and eucalyptus. Artificial vegetation may help alleviate
the damaging consequences of the loss of natural vegetation on ecological
(biodiversity), also to ellaviate soil erosion around the environment (Capossoli,
2008).
Therefore there are numbers of factors that influence vegetation
distribution in Tanzania. Those
are;
Climate, this influences vegetation
distribution through temperature and rainfall. Rainfall or precipitation it
determine the type of vegetation whether forest, grassland or desert, this
because water needed for the plants growth and those areas with high rainfall
or precipitation have a lot of vegetation, for example pines, mangrove, woodlands,
conifers at coastal areas, Njombe, Iringa, and Mbeya because it receives high
rainfall per year. While in dry areas contain poor vegetations for example in
central part of Tanzania vegetation which found are shrubs, grasses, and baobab
trees. Temperature also plays a big role in distribution of vegetation (flora)
i.e. whether the forest is tropical or coniferous or the grassland is temperate
or tropical (savanna). Where mean monthly temperature remains above 210C
for the year and there is a continuous growing and rainy season, broad- leaved
evergreen trees tend to dominate (tropical rainforest). Places where there is a
resting period in tree growth, either in hot climates with a dry season or cool
climates with short growing season, are more likely to have coniferous trees as
their dominant vegetation (Waugh, 2005: 256). Also it controls physiological
process in plants like rate of growth, fertilization, seed germination and flowering.
Some plants need cool conditions or cool in term of temperature therefore in
area with high temperature always vegetations also are few and in cool
condition many vegetation are growing and existing healthly throughout of the
year, because the amount of soil moisture is high than in area with high
temperature for example at Isimani, and Kongwa during summer time.
Soil, in some parts there is considerable
local variation in vegetation due to differences in soil and underlying parent
rock for example grass on chalk, conifers on sand, and deciduous trees on clay.
Plant growth is affect by soil texture, structure, acidity, organic content,
depth, water and oxygen content and nutrients (Waugh, 2005: 305). Therefore soil
determine the vegetation of a given place, this is because different plants
require different types of soil, the soil also determine the amount of moisture
it can holds, dense vegetation is found in most fertile soil, for example Nyumba
nitu forest, Lupembe forest, and Luponde forest at Njombe the soil it allows
different vegetation to be present and in poor soil sparse vegetation are found
for example at central zone in Tanzania (Tabora, Shinyanga, Singida, Mara and
Dodoma) many parts have poor soil that’s why even vegetation are few in number.
Relief and drainage, some plants grow well in
slope area while others need flat area. Different plants also require different
altitude for them to grow (George, 2003: 704). There is vegetation that is
suite to low area and those suited to high area and even the number of
vegetation is high in low land area than in high land area like mountains or
any hills have few vegetation in high land, a good example at kilimanjano, and Iringa
(Kilolo) there are many vegetation in low land. Drainage also determine the vegetation of a
place, there are plants grow best in areas of good drainage and are many while
others grow well in swampy condition for example papyrus which only grow in
swampy area, mangrove in shallow salty sea areas therefore in area with few or
no drainages have few vegetation comparing to area which have many drainage for
example Iringa (Mfindi) have many vegetation comparing to area like Dodoma
(Kongwa and Chamwino) few drainages hence few vegetation also.
Human
activities, man also contributes the distributions of vegetation of an area.
Such activities are planting trees in a place which did not have any vegetation,
irrigations and burning vegetations, when the vegetation of areas is burnt the
growth of other vegetation are encouraged to grow. While if man clear the area
for introducing farms, buildings and infrastructure like roads makes an area to
have few or no vegetation, for example area around Kilimanjaro mountain.
Government
policy, affect the vegetation distribution, government has gazetted some areas as forest reserves and
National Parks in that area tends to have many species of plants for example
areas like Ngorongoro at manyara, mikumi at Morogoro, selous at lindi, mkomazi
at Arusha and Serengeti at Kilimanjaro. Also through policy like Cut one tree
plant 10 trees and re-aforestation has also affected the distribution of
vegetation around the environment (Simiyu et al, 2004). But on other areas
which is not kept as a National Parks or Game reserves vegetations are reduced
by cutting down vegetation for various activities like buildings, farming,
introducing infrastructure therefore even the number of vegetation are few
comparing to forest reserves and National Parks are many.
Aspect,
(the direction in which a slope faces) affects sunlight, temperatures and
moisture. South facing slopes in the northern hemisphere are more favorable to
plant growth than those facing north because they are brighter, warmer and
drier (Waugh, 2005: 305). Therefore aspect it also influences vegetation
distribution in Tanzania. The area facing the sun receives more sunlight and
hence is warmer than the leeward side. For example the southern part of Mount
Kilimanjaro receives more insulation than Northern shapes facing Kenya. This
affects the rainfall regime and vegetation growth such that southern shapes are
conducive for plants growth while Northern slopes have poor vegetation.
Wind,
affects the distribution of vegetation in Tanzania through the processes of pollination
and seed distribution. Winds tend to transport pollens and seeds from one place
to another, which leads the coverage of vegetation in particular area to be
high than other areas (Waugh, 2005: 257). In addition, the place which have a
strong wind there are few vegetations exist like at Tabora, Singida and Dodoma
during summer period in this areas or regions experience strong wind, sometime
vegetation become destructed than area where wind blows normal like Iringa,
Njombe, Mbeya, Morogoro, and Mwanza many vegetations are present.
Generally, vegetation can help to get timber, food to man, climate control, pollution
abatement, wildlife maintenance (provides shelter and food for wildlife), and preserving
adequate water supplies. In Tanzania various parts Deforestation has been taking
place highly, something led some areas which was not experiencing semi desert
now experiences it for example at Isimani- Iringa, climate has changed
comparing to the previous. Therefore we encourage planting trees and other
vegetations in various parts of our country to recover the situation as normal especially
areas which now do experience semi- desert and the government has to implement
all policies toward environmental conservations.
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