On 23 July 2024, Arrie van Wyk sadly passed away from a heart attack. He was in the bush in the Mozambique component of the Great Limpopo Transfrontier Conservation Area. A vast transboundary landscape spanning 100,000 km2, incorporating five national parks and three countries. Arrie dedicated much of the last 23 years of his life to help realise this ambitious conservation vision. He was a true conservation hero who tirelessly worked behind the scenes to translate the vision of Peace Parks into reality on the ground. He was the right man at the right time for the task at hand.
Arrie started his career after he obtained a B.Sc. (Hon) degree at the University of Potchefstroom in 1981 and was later awarded a M.Sc. for his thesis on the management of Mthethomusha Game Reserve as a tribal resource area. In 1983 he joined KaNgwane Parks as Senior Warden and when he left 12 years later, he held the position of Director: Conservation. For the next six years he worked for the Mpumalanga Parks Board and by 2001, he was the Senior General Manager responsible for Conservation in the Province.
In November 2001, at the young age of 43, Arrie took on the most ambitious role in his career when joining Peace Parks Foundation. Arrie combined forces with his Mozambican counterpart, Gilberto Vicente, and together they were tasked to transform a vast one-million-hectare hunting area called Coutada 16 into a national park in Mozambique. Together, with his experience in conservation and Gilberto’s natural leadership abilities, they became true conservation pioneers.
This massive wilderness land parcel bordering South Africa’s Kruger National Park had no infrastructure or wildlife.
Undaunted, Arrie and Gilberto set about laying the foundation for one of the most ambitious African landscape restoration programmes undertaken in the past century. It involved demining a million hectares, building hundreds of kilometres of roads, countless bridges, staff accommodation for 200 employees and the first tourism facilities. A landmark achievement was dropping fences with South Africa and building new fences on the eastern boundary of the park, all on the back of a well-considered and planned approach. The work involved collaborating with communities and embarking on an ambitious rural development livelihoods improvement programme that today is still benefitting over 25,000 people. In addition, and no small feat, they rewilded the park by introducing close to 5,000 head of game that today far exceeds 20,000 animals. They did so in a structured, thoughtful manner and today, Limpopo National Park is well on its way to becoming one of Mozambique’s flagship national protected areas.
In September 2008 Arrie was promoted to join the Peace Parks head office team and took on the role of Project Manager responsible for the development of all ten transfrontier conservation areas (TFCAs) throughout southern Africa in the Peace Parks portfolio. A combined land mass equivalent to the size of France and Spain. Arrie excelled in this role and was promoted to Senior Project Manager in 2018 where he oversaw Peace Parks’ involvement in the planning, development and implementation of the world’s biggest transfrontier conservation area, the Kavango Zambezi spanning five countries; and the development of the Malawi-Zambia Transfrontier Conservation Area. Arrie did so in an unassuming way, working tirelessly and again putting the building blocks in place, that today form the foundation for everyone working on making this ambitious dream a reality.
Arrie also spearheaded the establishment of the first community conservancy ever established in Zambia, the Simalaha Community Conservancy. He was instrumental in developing a new model of how Peace Parks interacted with its government conservation partners to restore these protected areas. Peace Parks needed an integrated approach to work with governments and the local communities as partners; where the stakeholders had shared vested interests and accountability in restoring and developing protected areas. In a landmark step towards sustainable conservation in the Malawi-Zambia TFCA, Peace Parks and the Malawi Government signed an innovative and progressive long-term co-management agreement in 2023. This partnership aims to restore and develop the majestic Nyika National Park, Malawi’s largest and oldest national park. The momentum continued in 2024 with the ambitious expansion to the vast 2.6 million hectare Sioma Ngwezi Complex in Zambia. These initiatives within the Malawi-Zambia and KAZA transboundary landscapes are a testament to the visionary role played by Arrie, whose dedication to preserving our natural heritage shines through these efforts. This co-management model is now rapidly becoming the new gold standard of how to constructively ensure inclusive and robust governance with multiple stakeholders, including the local communities, when restoring and managing protected areas.
Nearing his retirement age, Arrie desired to go back to the bush for one last time. In June 2022, he took on the kind of challenge that he liked most – to be hands-on involved in conservation and restoration on the ground. He joined Akashinga and was tasked to transform an abandoned hunting block, Coutada 5, in Mozambique into a wilderness paradise. Arrie had come full circle as he was yet again in nature and constructively contributing to realising the vision and ideals of the Great Limpopo Transfrontier Conservation Area. It was here, after breakfast and over a cup of coffee that he suffered a massive and fatal heart attack – two weeks before his 67th birthday.
Arrie was a conservationist at heart, humble, kind and soft-spoken. He is leaving a lasting legacy in conservation. He will be remembered fondly as a conservation pioneer and a son of Africa. The world is a poorer place without him.
We will sorely miss him and are honoured to have known him.
On behalf of the Peace Parks team, our sincerest condolences to his family and, in particular, to his wife Colleen and children Arrie jnr, Ilana and Hannes and all the friends and colleagues that had the privilege to cross his path. We will honour Arrie’s legacy by keeping on doing what is right and what is needed to make the world a better place where nature and people can co-exist.
Rest in peace Arrie.
Werner Myburgh
Chief Executive Officer
Peace Parks Foundation
