|
Tanzania was formed out of a 1964 Act of Union between the mainland area, formerly known as Tanganyika, and the Zanzibar islands, comprising Unguja and Pemba, off the east coast of Africa. 
The union followed the signing of an agreement between the two founding leaders, Mwalimu Julius Nyerere of Tanganyika and Abeid Amani Karume of Zanzibar.
Tanzania is one of Africa's most politically stable countries. However, it is also one of the least developed, with the majority of its citizens living below the poverty line of less than US$1 a day.
Significant macroeconomic and structural reforms introduced since the mid-1990s have also undermined essential services, such as health and education, hitting poor families hard, according to Save the Children UK. Tanzania Country Brief
Moreover, the country's huge external debt has had a negative impact on the economy and on efforts aimed at alleviating poverty and improving health.
The rising HIV/AIDS prevalence in the country is also becoming an increasing burden on financial resources, with Tanzania's challenges including controlling the spread of the disease and creating better living conditions for the poor.
Peace and security
Tanzania, a former German and British colony, is one of the more stable countries in sub-Saharan Africa and has continued to enjoy peace, unlike most of its neighbours within the Great Lakes region.
However, problems of law and order, particularly banditry, are common in the border areas - often attributed to the large presence of foreigners.
The country has had a mainly peaceful history, despite having participated in a military intervention to overthrow Idi Amin, then president of Uganda, between 1979 and 1981.
Refugees
Tanzania hosts one of the largest refugee populations in Africa, at just over 683,000, because of massive refugee influxes after recurrent conflicts in Burundi and the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC). Most of the Congolese refugees originate from Fizi, in South Kivu Province.
Tanzania is also home to refugees from Somalia and Rwanda.
The refugees live in 12 camps in northwestern Tanzania where they are assisted by the United Nations Refugee Agency (UNHCR), and in three largely self-sufficient settlements.
Some of the challenges facing refugees include their lack of the right to work legally and lack of freedom of movement, leaving them dependent on assistance from UNHCR and its partners to meet their basic needs.
UNHCR is seeking to help 75,000 Burundian and 48,000 Congolese refugees to return home in 2007 with progress towards finding durable solutions for refugees in Tanzania being closely linked to political developments in Burundi and the DRC, according to the agency.
The refugee agency's programmes in the country cover the needs of camp-based refugees, support for refugee-hosting areas and repatriation of Burundian refugees.
There are an estimated 300,000 to 500,000 refugees from Burundi and DRC who have settled in several villages in the northwestern parts of the country, with some reported to have arrived in the early 1970s, according to the Tanzanian government.
Democracy and governance
After independence, Tanzania was governed under the Ujamaa (socialist) system by the country's first president, Julius Nyerere. The system emphasised justice and equality and nationalised the country's assets, including factories and banks.
However, due to the failure of the system, capitalism was introduced by subsequent presidents.
Currently, Jakaya Kikwete, of the Chama Cha Mapinduzi (CCM) party, is serving as the fourth president after winning the 2005 elections.
Tanzania is a unitary republic based on multiparty parliamentary democracy; multiparty politics were introduced in 1995.
It has 26 administrative regions (21 in the mainland and five in Zanzibar) and 130 administrative districts (10 in Zanzibar and 120 in the mainland).
Governance in all sectors has been decentralised to the districts with the central government performing a policymaking role, according to the United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA).
According to the World Bank, key constraints to the country's Poverty Reduction Strategy Paper reforms include corruption in the administrative and judicial system.
Tanzania is ranked 93rd out of 160 countries according to corruption watchdog Transparency International's 2006 Corruption Perception Index (CPI), with a score of 2.9.
The CPI score relates to perceptions of the degree of corruption as seen by business people and country analysts, and ranges between 10 (highly clean) and 0 (highly corrupt).
Media
There is genuine press freedom in Tanzania, despite the susceptibility of some politicians to seek litigation for defamation, according to media watchdog Reporters Sans Frontières.(RSF) 2006 annual report for Tanzania.
However, Zanzibar is a black spot for press freedom, with the government on the semi-autonomous island often attacking the independent press, accusing it of being "a threat to national unity".
Economy
Agriculture is the mainstay of the economy, accounting for about half the national income, three-quarters of merchandise exports and as a source of food and employment for at least 80 percent of the population.
The Zanzibar economy is mainly dependent on clove products.
Besides agriculture, trade, tourism and other service sectors are major contributors to economic growth in Tanzania.
Tourism is a leading source of foreign exchange due to the popularity of the famous Serengeti Park, renowned for wildebeest migrations and Africa's highest mountain, Kilimanjaro.
Mining and construction are the fastest-growing sectors, with growth rates of 15.6 and 11 percent in 2004 respectively. The real gross domestic product growth rate has averaged at least 6.9 percent since 2001 and was 7.0 percent in 2005.
According to the World Bank, per capita income in 2005 was estimated at about $330.
Population
Tanzania's population of an estimated 38.3 million doubled between 1978 and 2003, according to a 2002 census.
According to UNFPA, the government views its fertility rate of five births per woman and the under-five and maternal mortality levels as unacceptably high.
Tanzania has more than 120 ethnic groups with the major groups (more than one million members) including the Sukuma, Haya, Nyakyusa, Nyamwezi and Chagga. Other groups include the Pare, Sambaa or Shambala and Ngoni.
Most Tanzanians have Bantu origins. Nilotic groups or those of related origin include the nomadic Maasai and the Luo, who are found in greater numbers in neighbouring Kenya.
Two small groups speak languages of the Khoisan family typical of the people of the Kalahari in southern Africa. Cushitic-speaking peoples, originally from the Ethiopian highlands, reside in a few areas of Tanzania.
The main religions are Christianity, Islam and traditional faiths. In Zanzibar, by contrast, the population is predominantly Muslim.
The national or official languages are Swahili and English. Other languages include Bena, Datooga, Digo, Fipa, Gogo, Ha, Haya, Hehe, Kuria, Langi, Maasai, Makonde, Matengo, Nyamwezi and Sukuma.
With the majority of the population living in poverty, Tanzania has a Poverty Reduction Strategy Paper aimed at halving poverty by 2010 through a multi-sectoral approach involving three clusters: economic growth and poverty reduction, improvement in living conditions and social wellbeing, governance and accountability.
Development indicators
Tanzania is ranked 162 out of 177 countries with data with a Human Development Index value of 0.430, according to the UN Development Programme's Human Development Report for 2006.
At least 44.4 percent of the population have a probability of not surviving past 40, with life expectancy at birth low at 45.9 years for both men and women.
The combined primary, secondary and tertiary gross enrolment ratio is 47.8 percent.
The adult illiteracy rate as a percentage for the population over 15 is 30.6 percent. Overall, the adult literacy rate for the population older than 15 is 69.4 percent.
Education
Tanzania had one of the lowest net enrolment ratios for secondary school education; fewer than 20 percent of the children enrolled in primary education proceed to secondary schools, according to the UN Children's Fund (UNICEF).
Moreover, by 2000 only 55 percent of seven-year-olds were enrolling in primary education.
However, the enrolment rate has gone up after a 2002 government decision to waive school fees for primary-school children, with the net enrolment for primary school for boys and girls at 95 percent in 2005 up from 58.8 in 2000.
This has, however, led to a shortage of teachers, with classes of more than 100 pupils common, according to UNICEF.
Tanzania's literacy rate in 2005 for males between 15 and 20 years was 93.8 percent compared with 89.4 for females according to UN Education, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO).
Low salaries for teachers remains a major challenge facing the education system in Tanzania, with primary-school teachers earning less than 80,000 Tanzanian shillings ($80) a month while their secondary counterparts earned 150,000 shillings ($150), according to a 2005 report by Hakielimu, a local NGO specialising in education issues.
HIV/AIDS has also had a great impact on education, with at least 140,000 teachers dying in the last two decades.
The public education system in Tanzania suffers from a lack of funds which severely constrains the quality of learning, according to Save the Children UK.
Children
Malaria is the leading child-killer while HIV has orphaned nearly a million children and forced others to assume household responsibilities beyond their years to care for their ailing parents, according to UNICEF.
Child mortality/morbidity is high with one in seven children dying before the age of five; two-thirds of deaths occur within the first two years of life.
Mother-to-child transmission of HIV is also thought to be an important contributor to child deaths in Tanzania.
Thousands of children in Zanzibar miss school because they engage in various forms of child labour, including fishing and picking cloves to supplement the family income; children make up about 4 percent of the estimated one million Zanzibaris.
The national immunisation programme reaches at least 90 percent of all children, according to UNICEF, which also provides support for Vitamin A supplementation and deworming programmes.
Health
Tanzania's public health service suffers from a chronic lack of resources leading to low quality healthcare; many poor and vulnerable families often lack access to health services.
Malaria is the leading cause of inpatient and outpatient consultations and the major child killer. Nationally it accounts for 30 percent of the total disease burden.
The estimated number of malaria cases ranges from 14 to 19 million per year, with the number of deaths estimated at between 100,000 and 125,000, of which about 80,000 are children under five.
Health economists estimate that the economic impact of malaria through loss of production and time at work results in the equivalent loss of 3.4 percent of GDP.
Most of the diseases affecting the population in Tanzania are attributable to preventable causes including HIV/AIDS, measles and malnutrition.
The poor health status of children is also affected by the lack of basic health services and clean water particularly in rural areas. The population with increased access to water rose from 32 percent in 1990 to 62 percent in 2004.
The nation's water policy targets are to raise the proportion of rural population that has access to safe and clean water from 53 to 65 percent by June 2009 and for the urban population in the same period from 73 to 90 percent.
Non-communicable diseases, including diabetes, hypertension, and cardiovascular diseases, due to lifestyle changes are also increasingly accounting for a rise in hospital admissions.
At least 30 percent of the population is also malnourished, according to the UN World Food Programme and 22 percent of children younger than five are underweight for their age, according to UNDP.
Meanwhile, authorities in Zanzibar partially lifted a ban allowing the importation of poultry from selected countries - a restriction had been imposed in 2005 to minimise the risk of avian flu spreading to the territory.
Zanzibar is also prone to frequent cholera outbreaks attributed to poor hygiene, with an estimated 35 people dying in the latest outbreak, which affected at least 100 people.
HIV/AIDS
HIV/AIDS is a major cause of premature death and is placing an increasing burden on the country's resources.
An estimated 1.4 million people are living with HIV in Tanzania, which has a prevalence rate of 6.5 percent for adults between the ages of 15 and 49 years.
Only 7 percent of HIV-infected women and men are receiving anti-retroviral therapy.
The condom remains taboo in the predominantly Muslim island of Zanzibar, where an estimated 8,000 people were living with HIV in 2006, up from 6,000 in 2002, being rarely incorporated into public awareness messages.
HIV-infected people occupy more than half of all available hospital beds and it is estimated that each adult case treated in the Tanzanian healthcare system absorbs about $290 per year in nursing and other costs.
According to the World Bank, rising HIV infections remain a key challenge to achieving sustainable improvements in poverty indicators.
HIV is also expected to have dire consequences on the productive labour force; the country's GDP could be 15 to 20 percent lower by 2015 due to HIV/AIDS against a scenario without HIV/AIDS.
The HIV response in mainland Tanzania and Zanzibar is coordinated by the Tanzania Commission for AIDS and the Zanzibar AIDS Commission respectively. The National HIV/AIDS Policy addresses the disease through provision of anti-retroviral therapy and preventive activities, including behaviour change campaigns, according to UNFPA.
Food security
Tanzania is classified as a low-income, food-deficit country by the World Food Programme.
Food insecurity is a major issue in many parts of Tanzania. Floods and drought, together with inefficient internal markets, often cause severe food shortages in areas where many families live on or below the poverty line.
At least 40 percent of the population lives in chronic food deficit areas where irregular rainfall causes recurring food shortages.
The major constraints facing the agriculture sector include decreasing labour and land productivity due to poor technology (an agricultural system reliant on manual labour) and dependence on unreliable, irregular weather conditions. Women constitute the main agricultural labour force.
HIV/AIDS has also exacerbated the poverty level and reduced agricultural productivity through decreases in available farm labour.
According to a 2004-2005 demographic health survey, 38 percent of children under five are chronically malnourished and have stunted growth for their age. Moreover, 30 percent of all regions in the country have stunted rates of more than 50 percent.
Gender issues
Tanzania has a high rate of domestic violence, according to a UN World Health Organization study in 2006, which showed at least a quarter of those interviewed having been subjected to non-partner physical violence from the age of 15, with the main perpetrators being teachers.
The abuse of women has also been linked to the payment of bride price, according to a study conducted by the Tanzania Media Women's Association between January and March 2006, whereby most of those interviewed linked insults, sexual abuse, battery, denial of their rights to own property, being overworked and having to bear many children to bride price.
Maternal deaths increased from 529 per 100,000 births in 1996 to 578 in 2005, according to the Ministry of Health. Moreover, only 45 percent of women attending prenatal clinics were seen by qualified personnel.
Female Genital Mutilation prevalence declined from 18 percent in 1996 to 15 in 2005, according to a Ministry of Health study released on 1 December 2006.
At least 30 percent of the seats in parliament are reserved for women.
Human rights
Human rights activists have complained of appalling prison conditions, including overcrowding. By May 2005, the prisons held at least 45,000 prisoners, double their capacity. This was attributed to delays in disposing of cases, and the jailing of even minor offenders.
According to UNFPA, the government has set up a National Human Rights Commission to monitor human rights and collaborates with a network of NGOs such as the Tanzania Women Lawyers Association and the Women's Legal Aid Centre to promote gender equality.
These NGOs have supported the enactment of laws, such as the Sexual Offences Special Provisions Act, that protect the rights of women and children.
Humanitarian issues
The priorities in Tanzania include education, healthcare and food security, and improving the lives of vulnerable and marginalised children.
Having received hundreds of thousands of refugees from countries within the Great Lakes region, Tanzania is also looking to the international community to help reduce the refugee load, according to UNHCR.
Moreover, international support is essential in helping the country deal with the many challenges it faces in the pursuit of national development.
CREDIT : IRIN - United Nations Office – Humanitarian Country Profile
|
