An initiative by KwaZulu-Natal Wildlife and the Wildlands Trust aims at involving locals in conservation development for economic gain
Niki Moore
The Lake St Lucia World Heritage Site in Zululand might have one of the world’s most valuable wetland systems, but the rural women living nearby who have to walk 2km every day to fetch water don’t really care about that.
The Ukhahlamba Drakensberg World Heritage Site might have some irreplaceable San rock paintings, but the neighbouring herdsmen don’t give a hoot about that either. The malnourished teenager living on the border of the Mkuze game reserve doesn’t know that the animal he is eyeing through the electric fence might be the last of its species all he knows is that barbed wire stands between him and dinner.
This has been the dilemma for conservationists in KwaZulu-Natal for decades how to resolve the conflict between using the environment efficiently and providing community access to natural resources.
In 1996 KwaZulu-Natal Wildlife began to pursue a non-confrontational approach towards nature conservation through the involvement of communities referred to as “breaking the fetters that tie communities to a subsistence economy”.
The organisation initiated a pilot programme intended to involve rural communities particularly those surrounding the Greater St Lucia Wetland Park in conservation development for economic gain. At that time it was called the Eco-Partners Programme and was funded by The Green Trust.
However, throughout the country rural communal land is administered by the Department of Agriculture and Land Affairs, while in the KwaZulu region title to all communal land is held by the king. The traditional authorities, the amakhosi, have control over the allocation of land to build houses, graze cattle or plant crops. But all commercial land use is controlled by the iNgonyama Trust, a parastatal with a board appointed by the minister of agriculture and land affairs and the king.
During 1999 the Eco-Partners Programme (which was later absorbed into NGO the Wildlands Trust) helped three communities to obtain two-year leases from the iNgonyama Trust for portions of land to develop them into tourist attractions.
The Wildlands Trust has committed itself to change these agreements to 70-year leases if the communities concerned can submit viable business plans, obtain funding and secure the relevant permissions from the various government departments.
Given the level of sophistication and resources of most of the KwaZulu rural communities, putting together business plans and funding proposals can be a tedious process, as they have had little exposure to such complicated paperwork.
To this end the Wildlands Trust and the three communities have launched a Species, People and the Conser- vation of the Environment (Space) programme.
Space is funded by the United States-based Ford Foundation and operated as an extension of the Eco-Partners Programme of the Wildlands Trust whose aim is to manage communal land that lies alongside the game reserves.
The goal is to use communal land to create corridors between national parks that will both expand the land area under conservation and create economic opportunities for the people who “own” the land.
This will lead to “superparks” enormous tracts of reserve that will be a drawcard for hordes of tourists.
However, the amount of paperwork required to get this far is daunting.
The first task of the Space programme was to appoint a facilitator to help the communities with capacity-building regarding the conception and outlining of viable business plans. Sue McClintock took up this position last month. She has a background in scenario planning and project facilitation with the Council for Scientific and Industrial Research.
To date Space has obtained 16 community “clients” whom they assist with projects. Some have completed the first requirement for their leases, which is to create Section 21 companies (non-profit) to hold the lease. The second hurdle is the delay related to land claims, as much of the formally protected conservation land in KwaZulu is subject to land claims. Space will assist communities through the restitution process. Some claims have been settled swiftly on the grounds that land will be used for the community conservation programmes as spelled out in the Space programme.
There are three areas provisionally marked for community conservation development corridors. The first is the Tembe/Ndumo corridor. The formally protected areas are the Tembe Elephant Park and the Ndumo Game Reserve. Areas identified by the community for possible inclusion as a community park would be the Usuthu gorge between Ndumo and the Swaziland border and the Mbangweni corridor between Ndumo and Tembe.
On completion, a game reserve could stretch across the north of Zululand, and from Swaziland in the west over to the Maputaland coastal forest on the east coast. With the possibility of a link with Mozambique’s Futi Corridor and the Greater St Lucia Wetland Park, this superpark will be a vast tranche of eco-systems to eventually form the Lubombo Transfrontier Park.
The conserved areas are already home to four of the Big Five, and the Tembe communities have requested that lions be introduced.
The second corridor could link the Mkuze Game Reserve to the Pongola Biosphere on the Jozini dam. Both reserves one private, one state-administered have several unique features, not the least of which is the Mkuze fig forest and the tiger-fishing at Jozini.
A corridor of community land between the two could link these attractions and create a migration trail for the Pongola elephants.
The third corridor is the Royal Zulu Biosphere a proposed 200 000ha conserved area adjacent to the Hluhluwe/Umfolozi Park and linking it to the Opathe Conservancy south of Ulundi. It would also include the Emakhosini project a vast cultural project in the heart of Zululand where many of the ancient Zulu kings are buried.
Apart from the capacity-building component, the Space programme will also facilitate the formation of small and medium businesses that will become involved in the developments as they unfold. These enterprises will be used for hands- on development aspects such as fence-building, lodge-building, road-building, maintenance, bush-clearing and trail guiding.
The Wildlands Trust, with KwaZulu-Natal Wildlife and other partners, has undertaken a programme to train community members in activities such as conservation, guiding, land management and lodge-management.
Once the fundamentals are in place it will be a short step towards establishing cultural or nature trails on community land, for example, canoeing, walking or horse trails.
An annual conference for all communities involved in the programme is envisaged to promote networking among members, share expertise and raise the profile of their projects as well as to receive guidance and feedback.