23 Jan 2018

Degradation of the savannah ecosystem has emerged as a serious threat to the country’s biodiversity and livestock-based economy.

Local Enterprise Authority (LEA) manager, Mr Agrippa Hengari revealed during Conservation Agreement (CA) training workshop, which attracted stakeholders in Ngamiland District

He said reduced resilience of the rangeland ecosystem was increasing the vulnerability of pastoral communities to environmental change and climate change.

Despite the country’s significant economic growth based largely on diamonds and tourism, he observed that poverty and unemployment remained major challenge particularly in rural areas.

Mr Hengari said pastoral agriculture represents the chief source of livelihood for more that 40 per cent of the nation’s 2.1 million residents noting that livestock represents an important source of status and well-being for the vast majority of Batswana, making the savannah rangelands a critical resource.

Furthermore, he revealed that in Ngamiland, the main economic sectors were tourism and agriculture stating that historically, the two main economic drivers were viewed as mutually exclusive, new thinking supported by sustainable land management principles promotes synergistic and cooperative co-existence of the two.

Opportunities and challenges of this thinking of co-existence, he said facilitate sharing of information and highlight opportunities that this brings to the communities in Ngamiland.

“As the Ngamiland community, we collectively need to constructively dialogue on this issue with open minds in order to carry everyone along and leave no one behind. The continued polarisation of the issue by opposing camps not willing to make any concessions and compromises on their respective positions only serves to disfranchise the entire district of many synergistic opportunities between the two economic sectors,” he added.

He said it was critical to learn how other people in neighbouring countries who are faced with similar challenges had tried to deal with the issues.

Mr Hengari stated that Ngamiland Sustainable Land Management Project (SLM) has introduced several innovative concepts of development to farmers in the district.

One such laudable concept is the charcoal production at Lake Ngami using bush encroachment that take sup grazing lands.

He said the charcoal project, once in full operation would create employment opportunities for many local community members and help alleviate poverty.

He hoped that stakeholders   would learn from the Conservation Agreement training, which shall be customised and domesticated to suit the local situation to the communities’ advantage.

Outlining the objectives of the training, SML project coordinator, Mr Innocent Magole explained that they intend to pilot the conservation project in the district to expose the community to certain things and see if they could work.

He said they had already identified some areas where the project would be piloted.

He also pointed out that the project had a large component of dialogue where people could share ideas and put them into perspective.

For his part, UNDP head of environment and Climate Change, Dr Oduetse Koboto said the district was faced with many challenges and solutions were amongst the communities.

He explained that the CA concept was more relevant as it aimed to look at challenges in a context that would come up with solutions.

He said it was surprising that whatever was in the area was in abundance, be it water, diseases, wildlife and other natural resources but the area still remained poor.

“We are not sure whether we are blessed or cursed but I could assure you that the concept aims to develop and empower the community resilience so that they come up with sustainable projects aimed to improve their livelihoods,” he added.

The training was organised by UNDP and GEF working in collaboration with Conservation South Africa under the theme of the workshop was “Healthy rangeland, productivity livestock, sustainable household.” ENDS