Host Community Information
Most residents in the Iringa region live off the land, growing corn and beans, in addition to raising a variety of livestock, including cows, goats, mules and oxen. Life is simple and serene. Most homes are constructed of handmade bricks or woven stick frames with mud walls, thatched roofs and earthen floors. Daily activities in each household include grinding and drying corn.
Tanzania's 100 or more different tribal groups are mostly of Bantu origin. The Sukuma tribe from Lake Victoria is the largest with a population of over three million. Other large tribes include the Haya, Chaga, Nyamwezi, Gogo, Ngoni, Nyakyusya and the Hehe, from the region where Global Volunteers serves. Some Masai also live here, across the northern plains and into Kenya. Tanzania boasts the greatest linguistic diversity in the whole of the African continent, with the Bantu, the Khoisan or "click" language, the Cushitic and the Nilotic languages.
Further, Tanzania has a very mixed society of Christians (45%), Muslims (45%) and indigenous beliefs (10%). The majority of Muslims are concentrated along the coast and in the islands.
|
|
|
