East African Business Week

ARUSHA, TANZANIA- As a Journalist with my small camera, I was disappointed that I could not be allowed to move out of the truck that took us on the tour of the Ngorongoro Crater under the management of the Ngorongoro Conservation Area Authority.
It is not allowed for any person visiting a national park to come out of the vehicle whether you want to take pictures or take a closer look at the animals themselves.
The best picture I missed was of the six lions that surrounded a Zebra, attacked it and later on overpowered it and shared it but the action was a distance away such that I couldn't move closer to the scene.
However I did not hesitate to be taken around the park to see what an asset God sent to the Tanzanians.
This is the Ngorongoro Conservation Area that was separated from the Serengeti Eco-system in the 1959 to conserve the natural resources in the area.
The area encompasses three spectacular Volcanic Craters, the Olduvai Gorge, huge expanses of savannah, forest and bush land making it the flagship of Tanzania's tourism industry.
The authority's Principal Tourism Officer Asantel Melita told journalists that the area measuring 8,300 square kilometres, is a place on earth where mankind and wild animals co-exist in harmony.
The authority became a Man and Biosphere Reserve in 1971 and was declared a World Heritage Site by UNESCO in 1979, the 70,000 people in the vicinity live in harmony with animals.
"It is now the responsibility of management to ensure that the people, animals and the environment are all protected and that is why we recruited 450 rangers and the local community development staff to ensure all are protected," he said.
Originally part of the Serengeti National Park when the latter was established by the British in 1951, in 1959 the Ngorongoro Conservation Area Authority (NCAA) was formed, separating NCA from Serengeti. Land within the area is multi-use, providing protection status for wildlife while also permitting human habitation.
Melita said the area's uniqueness lay in the fact that man, livestock and wild animals live in peace and the Maasai cattle can sometimes be seen grazing alongside Zebras on Ngorongoro's grassland.
"Even animals provide their own security. For example the Wildebeest can't see far beyond 300m but uses the noses to smell any enemy ahead.
The Zebra on the other hand can't see beyond 300m but can't smell beyond that, so you find that they are always staying together to warn each other in times of danger," he told East African Business Week in an interview during the tour.
Melita said their symbiotic life makes the Zebra eat first because they eat fine grass, the Wildebeest follows and Warthog and Gazelle eat last.
He said that apart from conserving world heritage, Ngorongoro plays a major role in national development.
"We pay 30% corporate tax, three per cent tourism tax, and remit 10% of our earnings to the treasury and last financial year, we remitted a total of $40m to the national treasury", he explained.
He said the authority also give over US$125,000 to the local District Council as well as supporting the area's Pastoralist Council, in addition to funding various community projects such as schools, hospitals, veterinary services and road construction," he adds.
Had it not become the world's sixth-largest unbroken caldera, then what is now known as the Ngorongoro crater could have been a towering volcanic mountain, as high as Kilimanjaro.
The crater is the large, unbroken, un-flooded caldera, formed when a giant volcano exploded and collapsed some three million years ago.
The Ngorongoro crater sinks to a depth of 610 metres, with a base area covering 260 square kilometres.
The height of the original volcano must have ranged between 4,500 to 5,800 metres high. Apart from the main caldera, Ngorongoro also has two other volcanic craters at Olmoti and Empakai, the former famous for its stunning waterfalls, and the latter holding a deep lake and lush, green walls.
On the leeward of the Ngorongoro highlands protrudes the iconic Oldonyo Lengai, an active volcano and Tanzania 's third highest peak after Kilimanjaro and Meru. Known to local people as the Mountain of God , Mount Lengai 's last major eruption occurred in 2007. At the mountain's foot is Lake Natron , East Africa 's major breeding ground for flamingoes.
For those who may remember this is the volcano that terrorized the entire East African plateau in 2007.
He said the area contains over 25,000 large animals including 26 black rhinoceros, over 7,000 wildebeests, 4,000 zebras, 3,000 eland and 3,000 Grant's and Thomson's gazelles.
 The crater also has 62 lions while higher up in the rainforests of the crater rim, are leopards, about 30 large elephants, mountain reedbuck and more than 4,000 buffalos, spotted hyenas, jackals, rare wild dogs, cheetahs, and other felines.
The legendary annual wildebeest and zebra migration also passes through Ngorongoro, when the 1.7 million ungulates move south into the area in December then move out heading north in June.
The migrants passing through the plains of the reserve include 1.7 million wildebeest, 260,000 zebra, and 470,000 gazelles.
The Lake Ndutu area to the west has significant cheetah and lion populations. Over 500 species of bird have been recorded within the NCA. These include ostrich, white pelican, and greater and lesser flamingo on Lake Magadi within the crater, Lake Ndutu , and in the Empakaai Crater Lake, where a vast bird population can be observed.
About 450,000 tourists visit Ngorongoro every year, accounting for 60 per cent of the average 770,000 tourists visiting Tanzania per annum.
Famous visitors include former US President Bill Clinton, the Queen of Denmark Magrethe II, former American Human Right Activist the Rev Jesse Jackson, Hollywood film star Chris Tucker, John Wayne, Prince William, and the entire delegation attending the 2008 Leon Sullivan Summit which took place in Arusha.
Some scenes from the Oscar winning Out of Africa and John Wayne's Hatari were filmed in Ngorongoro.