Wildlife conservation in Tanganyika under German colonial rule; TanzanianGerman Development Cooperation: Dar es

At the beginning of the new millenium the conservation of wildlife and other natural resources in Tanzania is undergoing major changes. Interestingly enough, the situation was the same in Tanganyika, German East Africa one century ago. Whereas today the new concepts are called sustainable use, involvement of rural communities and maintaining biological diversity, at the beginning of last century one was fearing imminent extinction of the large mammals and therefore introduced the first protected areas in Africa and early protective legislation. But even in those days some of the concepts of today had already been thought of by some far-sighted individuals. Economic benefits were regarded as a justification to conserve wildlife and wildlands. It was proposed to introduce trophy hunting as a tool to finance protection of the resource and to conclude a CITES-like international treaty to control the wildlife trade. The early history of modern wildlife conservation in Tanzania has not been researched in depth. Many records in the German language are awaiting to be rediscovered. 1. Commercial Wildlife Exploitation in the 19th Century Conservation had not been a topic prior to the arrival of the Arabs and Europeans on the East Africa