GEOGRAPHICAL SETTLEMENT PATTERNS IN RURAL AREAS

Settlement is a place where people live and interact with one another, and mostly share variety of things like social services, economic, political and environmentally. The settlement can be permanent or temporary for example, temporary settlement is a refugee camps and tourist camps while permanent settlements are in villages and towns. But according to Mandal R.B (2001), “Settlement is cluster of houses including surrounding land where people take their shelter and keep their possession.”

Rural settlement, these are settlement located outside town and cities. Rural area is a sparsely populated community that exists in the country centers and the main activity conducted is primary activities like agricultural practice by farmers. In Tanzania most over 86% of the people are found in rural areas who practice agriculture.

Settlement pattern is the arrangement of different villages and towns across a given country or city, associated with their household buildings influenced by geographical relief of an area and economic factors. Also Thomas J refers settlement pattern as “the way that buildings and houses are distributed in a rural settlement”.

There are some factors that influence settlement pattern as shown below:

Resource availability; the presence of resources within an area like forest, water bodies and minerals as a result this leads to attraction of people for permanent settlement within the area with resource because the resources are used for various activities, for example minerals like iron, copper, silver and gold are used to make utensils, ornaments and decorations.

Presence of infrastructures like roads and railways; infrastructures like roads that can be used for various activities like transportation of agricultural products maize and beans, transport goods to the industries or the market for sale. As a result this leads to attraction of people for settlement creating linear form of settlement.

Climate of an area; this involves the atmospheric condition of an area were by it varies from one area to another, for example Tanzanian regions such as Iringa and Mbeya  has sufficient climate for agriculture unlike to dry areas where there is no adequate climate hence presence of scattered settlement.

Relief of an area; here we look on the slope of an area, the slope on the earth’s surface can be gentle or steep slope. Areas with gentle slope seems to attract a lot of people because they can practice various activities like farming and pastoralism while areas of steep slope is not preferred by people for settlement because it contribute to soil erosion and does not support farming activities.

Historical factor; this involves historical believes in an area or in the community where by people of certain tribe settle within an area from generations to generations. For instance, since colonial period people believed that stay at the hills or mountains it easier for defense and security against your enemies.

Taking an example of Tanzanian regional areas, These types of settlement are classified under the following patterns depending on the nature of the associated factors explained as follows;

Linear settlement pattern; it is the settlement across roads, valley and mountains as the pattern seen to be in linear or line shape along the valleys as well as mountains though in some areas it is a result of different resourceful nature of an area such as roads and railways and the nature of farm distribution. 

Nuclear pattern; it is the settlement found in highly productive areas of alluvial plains like Hwang Ho Valley and Nile Valley. In this type of settlement houses are compact and congested in the center and the nature of this settlement depends on the nature of resources found in that area.  It is also found in hunting and fishing areas like Lake Nyasa, Victoria.

Dispersed pattern; this is the settlement pattern where people spread out wards and separated with a large piece of land but also found in hills, platues, forests and grass land. It is mostly found in areas of pastoralist settle far away from each other. 

Circular pattern; it determines the distribution of houses or buildings in a circular shape as it depends on the nature of resource. It is the settlement along the lakes and ponds where houses tend to surround the lake or pound so as to have their essential needs from that resource.

Rectangular pattern; it is the settlement pattern that has a rectangular shape. The pattern is commonly in areas with fertile plains were people surround the area in a rectangle shape. For example in Morogoro plains in the valley of pogolo people are settled rectangulaly.

Radial pattern; In this type, a number of streets converge on one center which may be a source of water (pond, well), a temple or mosque, a center of commercial activity or simply an open space. Thus, the streets seem to be radiating from a common center.