Photo: Reinhard Radke

The Serengeti North Road Project

A Commercial Road through Serengeti National Park
jeopardizes the Integrity of a World Heritage Site.
Alternative Routes could easily meet the economic needs and even
improve the Conservation Status of Serengeti National Park
 Background to the
Commercial North Road Project
The History: The road through the Northern Serengeti was first discussed about 14 years ago and
after an Environmental Impact Study by Norconsult in November 1996, the idea was refused for
negative environmental impacts(1).
The Present: The President of Tanzania, Jakaya Kikwete, has approved the plan to construct a major
commercial road across the Serengeti National Park, linking the Lake Victoria area with eastern
Tanzania. The road will cut directly through the Serengeti wilderness, which completely bisects
the path of the world famous annual wildebeest and zebra migration comprised of nearly 2 million
animals. The decision was made public and reported in the Tanzanian press. (See links on the
last page of this presentation). The final decision is expected after an environmental impact study
assigned by the government is completed.  
The Need: The intention of the road is to better link the Serengeti and Loliondo Districts to the
National grid of major roads. The proposed road is suggested in the Government’s 10 years
Transport Sector Improvement Program (TSIP; 2).
The Problem: The presently suggested routing of the commercial road is for 53 kilometers running
through the Serengeti National Park, dissecting the northern wilderness area of the Park. Giving
the increasing traffic, the road might become the greatest risk to the wildebeest migration and the
will compromise the integrity of the Serengeti as a natural wonder of the world upon which
Tanzania’s tourism depends.
 The need of linking Serengeti District and
Loliondo District to the national grid of major
roads is undisputed but can be solved
without dissecting the Serengeti.
 The proposed South Road and population density

NEW ROAD

PROPOSED
ALTERNATIVE
ROUTE
SERENGETI
 The Serengeti National Park

The wilderness areas of the north are a critical habitat

for endangered species like rhinos and wild dogs.
The Serengeti Management Plan allows no
commercials roads at all in these areas.

During the dry season, the wildebeests rely on critical

water sources in the Masai Mara,
north of the planned road.
Planned Commercial Road through Serengeti and the world
famous Wildebeest Migration    

Mugumu  

Loliondo  
 The planned Serengeti road in the future

“If you build a road – you will have increasing traffic!” That is true everywhere in the world
and consequences must be evaluated carefully.

Rwanda, Burundi and Eastern DR Congo have no rail links and are dependent on the
northern road link from Mombasa and the southern link from Dar es Salaam. Once a
tarmac road is built that links the existing tarmac Musoma – Mwanza Road to Arusha
it will be the best and easiest link between Mombasa Port with Rwanda, Burundi and
Eastern Congo and it will almost certainly attract large amounts of heavy long-haul
traffic.

Presently, 6 million tons are moved on these roads to central Africa every year, on
150,000 truckloads; that is on average 416 large trucks a day potentially rumbling
through Serengeti. This road traffic is increasing year after year. (Africa Trade growth
as per 2009 is 30% per annum. WTO)
The Wildebeest Migration and the new Road
Initially the new road will not have a great impact on the Wildebeest Migration. But
the
Wildebeest Migration will have a great impact on the traffic.
Increasing traffic will result in an increasing toll on human life and equipment through vehicle -
wildlife collisions. These – unacceptable – losses will force TanRoads to consider fencing.

Such fencing would truly mean the end

of the Great Migration as the

wildebeest, zebras and eland could not
reach the Mara River that is their only
water source in the dry season and
would die at the fence-line.
Botswana lost its wildebeest and zebra
migration with such fences. South Africa
lost similarly in Kruger National Park.
And in Canada, the elk migration in Banff
National Park was also compromised
because of a dissecting road.
Photo: Felix Borner / FZS
The Wildebeest Migration and the new Road

The loss of the Serengeti Migration – the last of its kind in the world – would not
only mean the end of Tanzania’s priceless natural and national heritage, the end
of the Serengeti as an iconic World Heritage Site but also a significant decline in
tourism in the Serengeti and in neighbouring Masai Mara Reserve in Kenya.  

Photo: Reinhard Radke

 The major reasons for not having a commercial road through the
Serengeti National Park

Photo: Anup Shah

•  In contradiction to the World Heritage Convention, the TANAPA Policy and the approved
Serengeti General Management Plan that does not allow commercial roads in wilderness
areas
•  Strong negative impact on Tanzania’s reputation as world leader in conservation
•  Direct negative impact on tourism revenue in Serengeti and countrywide.
•  Direct negative impact on the ecology, wildlife, migration, wilderness, security and
outstanding universal value of the Serengeti
•  Degradation of the iconic value that the Serengeti has in the world as the
greatest natural wildlife area.
UNESCO: Serengeti’s status – world heritage site in danger?

UNESCO stated on impact of plans to built Serengeti Northern Road on

the 34th Session of the World Herritage Committee, 25 July - 03 August
2010, Brazil:

“UNESCO might consider that this proposed alignment could

result in irreversible damage to the property’s Outstanding
Universal Value and would constitute a clear case for inscribing
Serengeti National Park on the List of World
Heritage in Danger and notes that feasible and less
environmentally damaging alternative to the North Road exist,
including the South Road proposal”.
 Serengeti as World Heritage Site

The Operational Guidelines of the World Heritage Convention states:

•  The State Party is obliged to demonstrate that any new development will not impact
on the Outstanding Universal Value of the property.
•  An Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA) must be carried out that clearly
demonstrates that the planned Serengeti road will have no impact on the values and
integrity of the site.
•  The State Party must submit such an EIA to the World Heritage Committee before
taking a decision on the development.
•  A development that leads to the loss of an Outstanding Universal Value could lead to
down-listing or even removing of a site from the World Heritage List, with potentially
grave impact on a countries reputation and tourism trade.

In a meeting of Heads of Parks from 14 African countries in the Kruger National Park in
2008 there was unanimous agreement that no commercial roads should lead through
National Parks.
UNESCO recommend strongly that existing commercial roads should be relocated
outside Parks and that new ones should be routed around Park boundaries.
 Wildlife – Vehicle Collisions

Wildlife – Vehicle collisions on a

commercial road will take a
heavy toll on wildlife but even
more so on people and
equipment.

In Europe roads through wildlife

areas are the cause of more than
300 fatal accidents and over one
billion $ loss of equipment.

With many thousands of

wildebeest crossing the road, the
damage to property and the loss
of human life is expected to
increase immense.

Commercial Roads in wildlife

areas have proved to be a
disaster all over the world
Photo: Okapia
 Ecological Consequences
27 Renowned Scientists strongly oppose the plans to build
a road through Serengeti.
A team of well-respected scientists has released a joint concern addressing their hesitation to build a
new road that would bisect the Serengeti National Park. With apprehension to the damage a road
would inflict on the ecosystem, the group of scientists clearly warns the Tanzanian government about
the ecological and economic consequences this road would have. The Opinion piece has been
published in Nature on 16 September 2010.

They have predicted the following negative impacts:

• Fragmentation of habitat for wildlife
• Disruption and obstruction of migration routes
• Introduction of invasive plants, animals, and disease
• Increased mortality due to wildlife-vehicle collisions
• Intensive, organized poaching, especially of reintroduced rhino
• Loss of habitat from human settlement and agriculture
• Increased human-wildlife conflicts requiring additional measures
• They estimate that it could precipitate ecosystem collapse and wild fires, dent tourism income and
perhaps even cause the system to “flip from being a carbon sink into a major source of atmospheric
carbon dioxide”
• The proposed road cuts through a critical wilderness area that is essential to the migration. The
migration itself could collapse, with a devastating effect on all wildlife and the entire ecosystem.
 Ecological Consequences

Evidence from other parts of the world, combined with our deep understanding of the Serengeti
ecosystem, makes this clear: A
world treasure will be seriously threatened.
The Serengeti, once gone, will never come back.

Tony Sinclair, one of the world’s foremost experts on the Serengeti, has said:
•  “The Serengeti Ecosystem has been studied for 50 years and is well documented. These studies show that the whole
system depends on the impacts of this massive migration, so that the ecosystem itself will change completely when the
migration disappears. Essentially the Serengeti as we know it will no longer exist. History has shown that once we start this
process of road development, there is no turning back on the sequence.”

Andrew Dobson, conservation biologist at Princeton, has said:

•  “If the wildebeest population declines by even fifty percent it could lead to an increase in the fire frequency in the park, as
less grass would be eaten – this could flip the entire system from a major carbon sink into a major source of carbon.”

Frankfurt Zoological Society:

•  “We sincerely believe that the road will have disastrous effects on the entire ecosystem. The northern parts of the Serengeti
and the adjacent Masai Mara are critical for the wildebeest and zebra migration during the dry season, as it is the only
permanent year-round water source for these herds. Recent calculations show that if wildebeest were to be cut off from
these critical dry season areas, the population would likely decline from 1.3 million animals to about 200,000 (meaning a
collapse to far less than a quarter of its current population and most likely the end of the great migration).”
 Direct impact of proposed road

Restric+ons  on   Direct  wildlife  mortality  

Habitat  fragmenta+on   animal  movements   (cri+cal  for  rare  and  
and  modifica+on   and  migra+on   endangered  species)  and  
routes   human  causali+es  

Planned  Serenge+  
Commercial  Road  

Introduc+on  of   Increased  impact  from  

Hydrological  system   exo+c  species  and   human  ac+vi+es:    
altered,  soil  erosion   environmental   poaching,  rhino  security,  
contamina+on   wilderness  experience  
Economic Consequences:
Impact on Tourism industry
The most important reason tourists are
visiting the Serengeti is man’s longing to be
part of nature, his eternal search for
wilderness and paradise.

Serengeti is one of the last places on

earth that represents how the world
looked a million years ago.
“Everybody needs beauty
A tarmac road with lorry traffic destroys this as well as bread, places to
illusion. The attraction that the Serengeti has play in and pray in, where
in the world will be lost and with it the nature may heal and give
admiration for Tanzania and the income from strength to body and soul”
tourism, presently the number one forex
John Muir
earner in the country. (Over 1 billion $$ in
2009, over 600,000 people employed)

The loss of migration will lead to reduced

populations of other wild animals that are
attractive to tourists – such as lions and
cheetahs.
Photo: Anup Shah
 Consequences of Proposed Serengeti Road
Reduced  value  for    
Decreased  
“High  income  –  low  
tourism  revenue  
impact”  tourism  
countrywide    
development  
Aesthe+c  value  
reduced  
Tanzania’s    
Commercial   reputa+on  
road  with   tarnished    
increased  
traffic  
Nega+ve  impact  
on  wildlife   Erosion  of   Down-­‐lis+ng  of  
Serenge+’s   Serenge+  to  
‘Outstanding   ‘World  Heritage  
Universal  Value’   in  Danger’  
 The importance of TANAPA sovereignty
on all National Park Roads
National Policies for National Parks in Tanzania: Article 9.10.1. “Park roads are not intended to provide
fast access and will not be planned, designed, or constructed if it can be
demonstrated that such a road will create THOROUGHFARES through
parks that will generate or attract non-park related activities and traffic.”

TANAPA, on the parks road network is enforcing:

•  Strict speed limit of 50 km an hour
•  No night driving
•  No off-road driving
•  Restriction on size of lorries
•  Pollution and waste disposal

As demonstrated in Mikumi National Park (and in other parks worldwide) such control is not
possible on a commercial road.
Traffic through national parks does not only affect wildlife, but also has an impact on people. Accidents
are likely to be numerous during the wildebeest migration when literally thousands of animals can
be on the road. This will inevitably lead to loss of human life.
 Economics of North- versus South- Road Alignment

Villages to be connected to
market by new road

North Road

South Road
 The economics of different road alignments
linking Arusha and Musoma Region
                     North South

App. Distance of new tarmac 421 km 383 km

Number of people served

along new roads (TBS ) 431,000 2,278,000

Not only is the proposed road likely to impact the iconic status of the Serengeti but the
southern road is shorter and would provide access for more agricultural markets – the
southern road passes through important agricultural areas in Tanzania, the northern
road does not. Over 5 times as many people could be serviced.

This would provide a major opportunity to increase agricultural output and distribution
across Manyara-, Shinyanga- and Mwanza-Regions and existing traffic through
Serengeti National Park can be reduced.  
 Way forward
The only way to avoid to severely reduce the conservation and economic value of the Serengeti
National Park, its status as a World Heritage Site and endangering and damaging Tanzania’s
reputation as world leader in conservation is to look for another alignment of the road outside the
National Park

After seeing the destruction the road through Mikumi National Park caused, the Government of
Tanzania has rejected other proposals for major public road building in Parks such as recently in
Tarangire National Park. A road through the Serengeti would provide even more human fatalities
and wildlife impact than the road through Mikumi as wildlife densities in Serengeti are much
higher. Recently the Government decided to reroute a planned tarmac road around Katavi
National Park instead of dissecting it as originally planned.

•  As suggested by a world bank study and Tanzania National Park, the planned road should be
routed around the Serengeti National Park to the south. (The existing Ngorongoro – Serengeti
road will remain as a tourist access road only) (1)
•  The southern version makes more economic sense as it will be serving over two million people
•  It will not impact on the value of the world famous Serengeti National Park and World Heritage
Site but immensely contribute to the economic development of Karatu, Meatu, Maswa, Bariadi
and Magu – Districts
•  The road from Arusha to Loliondo should be rehabilitated to link Loliondo efficiently

Any road in the Serengeti National Park should be for tourist access and park management – not for
transit and has to be under the control of TANAPA, including gates, no night driving, avoiding
critical areas for conservation, low speed…
 Way forward
•  Plan and build the south road tarmac
connection from Karatu to join the
existing Shinyanga - Musoma Road at
Meatu.
•  Upgrade the existing Murram road to
Tarmac from Meatu to Lamadi
•  Upgrade the Arusha - Loliondo Road
•  Close the existing murram National
Park Road through Seronera for
commercial through-traffic and
designate it for tourism access only
•  Improve the Musoma – Mugumu
access road

See following map

Photo: Anup Shah

 Way
forward:
the proposed
South Road
alignment

Existing Tarmac
Roads

Existing Murram
Roads anderer

Existing Murram
roads that need
upgrade

Proposed new
south Road

National Parks
road, tourism
access only
Tanzanian President’s Commitments to Nature
Conservation in Tanzania
"In accepting the trusteeship of our wildlife we solemnly declare that
we will do everything in our power to make sure that our children's
grand-children will be able to enjoy this rich and precious inheritance.“
Dr. Julius K. Nyerere, first president of Tanzania

On 21 May 2010, when the first rhinos of a big rhino repatriation arrived in the
Serengeti, President Dr. Jakaya M. Kikwete emphazised on the celebrations:
„This event is a stark reminder of what went wrong and the past and a
lesson for what needs to be done to prevent it from happening again.
My government is fully committed to conservation of wildlife in general
and to rhinos particularly.”
There are many roads that can be built but there is only
one Serengeti.

Frankfurt Zoological Society: info@fzs.org | www.fzs.org

References:

(1)  The northern road through the Serengeti National Park was vigorously rejected by a Norconsult study in
November 1996. See the United Republic of Tanzania Ministry of Works, Technical and Socio-Economic
Feasibility Study: Makuyuni – Musoma Road, Final Report. A different conclusion was reached by a more recent
report by Inter-Consult, prepared for the Ministry of Infrastructure Development in November 2007. See
“Tanzania National Roads Agency (TANROADS) Environmental and Social Impact Assessment, Feasibility
Study and Preliminary Design for Natta-Mugumu-Tabora B-Klein’s Camp-Loliondo Road (239km) Upgrading
Project” Volume 5, Environmental Impact Assessment Report: Final Report. This report recognizes that there will
be an impact on wildlife, but argues that it can be mitigated.

(2) http://allafrica.com/stories/201007051059.html

(3) Economic Impact on travel industry by savetheserengeti.org:

http://www.savetheserengeti.org/wp-content/uploads/2010/10/Econ_impact_10-06__sm.pdf

(4) Nature 467, 272-273 (16 September 2010) | doi:10.1038/467272a; Published online 15 September 2010;
http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v467/n7313/full/467272a.html

(5) UNESCO: http://whc.unesco.org/en/sessions/34COM/

Frankfurt Zoological Society: info@fzs.org | www.fzs.org