Zinhane, Mozambique – Ana Marta Francisco Chaúque viewed with pride the clearing where she stood. Two hectares of land had been planted with crops, and an additional five hectares were earmarked for this purpose. This small community development initiative represents a significant leap forward for conservation in southern Africa.
By improving their agricultural practices, Chaúque and 64 members of her community are helping to reduce food insecurity in Zinhane on the outskirts of Banhine National Park. Through a partnership between Mozambique’s National Administration for Conservation Areas and Parks Foundation, they have received seeds, irrigation and techniques for boosting crop yields.
“We have been learning techniques such as alignment, which facilitates effective water circulation,” she said.
Efforts such as this bring new hope to communities at the mercy of drought and flooding due to tropical cyclones, in increasingly erratic weather conditions due to climate change. Simultaneously, they tackle a challenge faced by many parks – poaching of wildlife and illegal logging by local people caught in the daily battle to survive.
In response, Peace Parks introduced a significant shift last year that is likely to have a lasting impact for communities.
“If wildlife and ecosystems are to thrive, we must value the presence of people in the landscape and work with them,” said Brad Poole, Chief Operations Officer. “As Peace Parks, we bring knowledge, investment and resources. We promote partnerships between Peace Parks, the communities, land and nature.”
Community development is key to conservation
The need to work collaboratively with communities living inside and on the outskirts of protected areas has taken on greater importance since Peace Parks was formed nearly 30 years ago to establish transfrontier conservation areas. While the foundation has engaged in community development work for more than a decade, its 2030 Strategy, launched in 2023, has elevated this work to one of three key pillars for an ambitious vision – achieving conservation at scale by securing 980,000 km2 of functioning ecosystems by 2050. An estimated 400,000 community beneficiaries will also benefit directly.
“This shift has placed a stronger focus on building the resilience of communities in and around the parks we support, which means taking community development to a new level. We aim to achieve greater impact at greater scale,” said Helena Atkinson, Peace Parks Community Development Programme Manager.
She was speaking at a recent Peace Parks summit on community development at Maputo National Park, Mozambique to develop the capacity of practitioners to deliver on this strategic vision. They included experts from Peace Parks, Simalaha Community Trust, Mozambique’s National Administration for Conservation Areas and Malawi’s Department of National Parks and Wildlife.
“Staff and partners from Malawi, Mozambique, South Africa and Zambia gathered to share their experiences and learn from each other, while developing a concrete action plan to achieve Peace Parks’ transformative vision,” said Atkinson.
New community development programmes
Following on the success of Herding for Health, the Community Development programme plans to initiate seven new programmatic streams, which will include sports, carbon, education, health and well-being. Importantly, the education programme seeks to build long-term sustainability, while the carbon programme aims to bring a new stream of income for communities.
“Our aim for these communities is to create economic and livelihood opportunities that are distributed fairly,” said Atkinson. “We will ensure that the burden of living with wildlife and far from urban centres and the economic and basic services they provide is offset by the unique opportunities that come with living in a protected area.”
For instance, the education programme could give children in these communities the chance to spend a week in a park camp to learn about wildlife – an opportunity their urban counterparts may not have access to. The programmes will be launched in close collaboration with the relevant government departments and other partners in the landscape to achieve a coordinated impact.
“These programmes will be designed to help build the resilience of communities so that they are not only able to withstand the pressure of living in or next to protected areas, but to thrive in them,” Atkinson said.
