Tanzania HIV/AIDS and Malaria Indicator Survey 2011-12(Preliminary Results)

Preliminary results (tables only) for the malaria indicators and selected HIV indicators. The results were released by the National Bureau of Statistics on 11 October 2012. Full results of the survey are still being compiled and will be included in the final report

Direct Use of Low Enthalpy Deep Geothermal Resources in the East African Rift Valley

Geothermal energy is already harnessed across East Africa to provide hundreds of megawatts of electricity, with significant plans for future expansion towards generation at the gigawatt scale. This power generation utilizes the high steam temperatures (typically more than 200 °C) that are available in several locations in Kenya, Ethiopia and elsewhere. The presence of these high enthalpy resources has deflected attention from the often attractive low and medium enthalpy resources present across a more extensive portion of the region. Geothermally heated water at cooler temperatures (less than 90 °C) could be widely produced by drilling shallower and cheaper boreholes than those required for power production. This low enthalpy resource could be widely exploitable throughout the Rift Valley, offering a low carbon, sustainable, reliable and commercially competitive source of heating, drying and cooling (via absorption chillers) to local farmers and growers, and for low temperature commercial and industrial uses. Applications of this type would displace expensive fossil fuels, reducing costs and carbon emissions as well as improving the region’s energy and food security. The power input for pump systems can be accommodated by relatively small generators, so direct heat projects could be beneficial to consumers in areas with no grid access

Prediction of runoff and discharge in the Simiyu River (tributary of Lake Victoria, Tanzania) using the WetSpa model

International audienceA spatially distributed hydrologic model (WetSpa) is used to estimate daily river water discharge in the Simiyu river a tributary of Lake Victoria, Tanzania. The model combines topography, landuse and soil maps, and observed daily meteorological time series to predict discharge hydrographs and the spatial distribution of hydrological parameters in the catchment. The elevations in the catchment range from 2000 to 1100 m at the outlet, with average slope of 1.4%. The dominant landuse types are, wasteland, grassland, bushland, cultivated land, and a very small area is covered by surface water. The dominant soil types are sandy loam, followed by sandy clay loam, clay loam, clay, loam and sandy clay. There are two distinctive seasons in the Simiyu catchment. Short rains mainly in November, December and January, and long rains in March to May, resulting in a total average annual precipitation of 700 to 1000 mm. The annual potential evapotranspiration is about 1300 mm, and the river discharge at the catchment outlet ranges from 0 to about 200 m3/s. Global parameters of the model are calibrated using three years of daily observed discharge values measured at the mouth of the river at Lake Victoria. The estimated average travel time of the runoff to the outlet of the catchment is about 2.4 d and maximum 8 d for the most remote areas. The model results also show that the surface runoff and interflow provide respectively 38.6% and 61.4% of the total runoff, while the contribution of groundwater drainage is nil. The absence of groundwater drainage is probably due to the high evaporation demand of the atmosphere, which accounts for about 90% of the total precipitation being lost by evapotranspiration. The annual water balance estimated with the model reveals that the total outflow to Lake Victoria is about 500×106 m3 per year, which occurs mainly in the wet seasons, i.e. from March to May and from November to January. The volume of runoff produced by agricultural land amounts to about 9% of the total runoff annually

Decision-making on shared sanitation in the informal settlements of Kisumu, Kenya.

Unlike most quantitative studies that investigate decision-making on investing in sanitation, this study adopted a qualitative approach to investigate decision-making on shared sanitation in the informal settlements of Kisumu city, in Kenya. Using a grounded theory approach, landlords and tenants were interviewed to identify sanitation decisions, individuals involved in decision-making and factors influencing decision-making. The results indicate that the main sanitation decisions are on investment, emptying, repair and cleaning. Landlords make investment, emptying and repair decisions, while tenants make cleaning decisions. Absentee landlords are less involved in most decision-making compared to live-in landlords, who rarely consult tenants in decision-making. Tenants make decisions after consultations with a third party and often collectively with other tenants. Sanitation interventions in informal settlements should thus, target landlords and tenants, with investment efforts being directed at landlords and maintenance efforts at tenants

Enhancing productivity of water under variable climate

Crop productionMaizeClimateRainFamersDecision making

Living collections of botanic gardens as a means of ex situ conservation : a case study of African Violets (Saintpaulia) in Europe

In all plant conservation, the priority is to maintain wild populations in situ (on site), which means that plants are conserved within their natural environment. Sometimes, as in the case of severely endangered Saintpaulia H. Wendl. (African violets), this is however, no sufficient. In that case, ex situ (off site) conservation in the form of live and in vitro collections and seed banks is necessary. In recent years, the role of botanic gardens in conservation and reintroduction of threatened plants, has been increasingly recognized. Botanic gardens throughout the world possess large living collections of species and accessions, but only vague assumptions of the utility of them in ex situ conservation have been made thus far. Whole plants, when kept ex situ, have advantages in education, research and display. On the other hand, living collections have the disadvantage of high maintenance costs, including high spatial requirements. Thus, usually only one or few genotypes are represented. The goal of this study is to evaluate botanic garden live collections as a means of ex situ conservation with the genus Saintpaulia as a case study. As a result, an ex situ conservation plan for Saintpaulia is outlined. Workability of a network ex situ conservation activity in botanic gardens is also evaluated. Four of the five most important European Saintpaulia holders were chosen as target botanic gardens: Helsinki University Botanic Garden (Finland), The National Botanic Garden of Belgium, The Botanic Garden of Uppsala University (Sweden) and the Royal Botanic Gardens Edinburgh (UK). The wild Saintpaulia collections of the gardens were reviewed and the identifications checked. Botanic garden databases were examined to trace clone accessions. Leaf cuttings from wild-collected accessions were planted in Helsinki University Botanic Garden. Of the total 183 Saintpaulia accessions of the four target gardens 155 (85 %) were unique, and 126 of these were of known wild origin. They were chosen to ex situ conservation collection. Due to the varying quality of the data of origin of the accessions, five classes for the different quality of origin data were developed. European botanic garden living collections of Saintpaulia proved to be a workable base of ex situ conservation for the genus. The amount of space needed to conserve the ideal of at least 50 unique accessions of each of the 26 Saintpaulia taxa is best possible to organize with the network ex situ conservation programme: each accession will be stored in at least two botanic gardens, but no garden will have all the accessions. Saintpaulia is an ideal genus for living ex situ collections: it is beautiful and well-known, small-sized and easy to grow and propagate. New ex situ accessions will be collected from the wild and finally reintroduced to their natural habitats. Further research needs to be carried out to find out the proper seed banking mechanisms for probably orthodox but dust-like seeds of Saintpaulia species. The lack of research on the basic biology and the population ecology of the genus hampers effective conservation work. Collaboration with amenity horticulture and the home countries of Saintpaulia is planned to utilize the genetic diversity of wild African violets in breeding new cultivars