Resource management based on traditional knowledge wins in Namibia
afrol.com, Copyright 2000
November 27, 2000
afrol.com, 27 November - In Namibia, one of the world's most fragile natural environments, conservation organisations such as the WWF have demonstrated that the use of traditional knowledge is vital in community based resource management. It is a win-win situation for economy and environment.
In 1999 WWF recognized the Namibian Government's gazettement of four new community conservancies as a "Gift to the Earth." Since then 10 communal area conservancies have been approved by the Namibian government, with nine of these being fully gazetted as locally managed protected areas, covering an area of 2,523,700 hectares.
The community conservancies are generating income for their members through a wide range of activities including ecotourism joint ventures (e.g. lodge development and community-managed campsites), cultural tourism, handicraft industries, hunting concessions and the sale of live animals for restocking other conservancies.
A new report released last week by the WWF show that the areas in the world most in need of conservation are inhabited by high concentrations of native cultures, and warned that the loss of traditional languages and knowledge may lead to further environmental degradation. The study highlighted that languages spoken by indigenous and traditional peoples are rapidly disappearing.
Since the ecological knowledge accumulated by indigenous people in their long history of managing the environment is embodied in languages, language extinction is leading to loss of ecological knowledge, especially since in most traditional cultures this knowledge is only passed on to other groups or new generations orally. The work of WWF in Namibia has strengthened the conservation organisation in its conclusions, observing how the traditional knowledge of the Himba, Herero, Damara and !Kung indigenous peoples of Namibia can play a key role in conserving and managing the country's fragile environment.
The natural environment of Namibia presents one of the most challenging conservation situations on earth. With most of the country falling within a belt of extremely low rainfall, the predominant landscapes in Namibia are deserts, semi-arid grasslands, and savannas. The land-use options in most of Namibia are extremely limited with the only perennial rivers being shared resources with Angola, Botswana, South Africa, Zambia, and Zimbabwe. Thus only a narrow strip of this vast country can be used for cultivation.
During the latter years of the South African government's administration of the UN trust territory, then known as South-West Africa, WWF South Africa joined forces with local conservationists to set up an innovative approach to wildlife conservation called the "community game guards" project. This project was based on the concept that indigenous peoples can be the best conservationists when they are given the responsibility and tools for managing their own natural resources, as well as the right financial incentives. Their clear understanding of how the ecosystems function is enhanced by a deep cultural attachment to the natural environment.
The community game guards project and other similar community based natural resource management projects have been so successful that many species of wildlife have returned to areas of Namibia where they had disappeared as a result of legal hunting and illegal poaching.
The process initiated by foreign NGOs has also spurred local interest in working with environmental issues. Integrated Rural Development and Nature Conservation (IRDNC) is a local NGO, which evolved out of the community game guards project. IRDNC is currently in the process of diversifying its funding sources to become less dependent on WWF - its major source of funding over the last decade. Among its objectives in 2000 are to improve the effectiveness of the community game guard networks in Kunene and Caprivi regions; consolidate and expand community-based ecotourism initiatives in the programme area, including training local community members as game guards; and encourage the involvement of local communities in other income-generating activities associated with wildlife and tourism.
Source: Based on WWF