Sistema de Batería de Intercambio Selectivo con Membrana

Aside from the potential ecological benefits from the scale of transboundary parks, advocates for TBPAs also actively promote the massive scale of some of these parks as a means of stimulating regional economic development. The roles of transboundary protected areas in the economic sphere are twofold – the promotion of ecotourism and the economic stimulation and development of marginalized rural communities. Parks and conservation areas of all types make similar claims, but three factors help to distinguish the extent of the claims of transboundary parks as compared to other protected areas. First, even more than normal, international

conservation NGOs and development agencies have been major proponents and financial backers of many transboundary parks. These same organizations are quite often involved in sponsoring, creating, and managing protected areas of all types throughout the world, but their role in TBPAs has been enormous (Duffy, 2001). Organizations such as the Peace Parks Foundation have been created solely for the purpose of transboundary protected areas and are backed by significant resources. As well, these organizations possess close connections with senior government officials and powerful business leaders. The Peace Parks Foundation’s Club 21, in charge of fundraising for transboundary parks in southern Africa, has included such political and business heavyweights as Nelson Mandela the former President of South Africa, Joaquim Chissano the former President of Mozambique, Prince Bernhard of the Netherlands, Sir Richard Branson, Ted Turner, and the Rothschild Foundation (www.peaceparks.org).

In a related trend, much of the support for transboundary initiatives comes from

predominantly Northern concerns of using large-scale protected areas, beyond the scope of most national parks, in the globalization of the commons (Schmidtz and Willott, 2003). In this manner, local environmental issues are often intricately linked to global environmental effects, and large scale conservation is seen as a means to minimize global environmental impacts (Hughes, 2005). Because over two-thirds of southern Africa’s population lives in communally held land, global commons advocates often view this land as an inexpensive, painless (for them) means of carbon sequestration, biodiversity conservation, and other issues of the global commons

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(Katerere et al., 2001; Katerere and Mohamed-Katerere, 2002). Transboundary conservation’s scale makes the ecological claims even louder and the international discourse often drowns out the voices of local communities. With discussions between heads of state, multi-billion dollar conservation groups, and international organizations such as the World Bank, the views of a few thousand peasants often seem to vanish.

A third difference between the creation of TBPA and other types of protected areas comes from the international development organizations – World Bank, USAID, GTZ, and others. As mentioned above, many advocates of protected areas of all types view TBPAs as sources of regional development through eco-tourism (McNeely, 1993; Chapin, 2004). The difference between TBPAs and other protected areas is that the transboundary efforts often take a prominent position within government tourism departments as regional economic zones, often even as Spatial Development Initiatives or the start of development corridors (Katerere et al., 2001). Over the past several years, the Peace Parks Foundation has helped to support and fund several positions within South Africa’s park service and Department of Environmental Affairs, as well as similar positions within the environmental departments of Botswana, Mozambique, and Zambia. The Department of Environmental Affairs and Tourism in South Africa went so far as to hire a coordinator to develop the role of TFCAs in furthering economic growth during the 2010 Soccer World Cup, hosted by South Africa. In several departmental reports, most recently in May 2007, South African officials view TFCAs as a tourist magnet to capitalize on soccer supporters and stimulate regional economic growth (van Schalkwyk, 2007). Before buying into the hype of economic development through TFCAs, however, we should explore the two primary economic arguments for them – the boon of ecotourism and the stimulation of rural economies.

Regarding the benefits from ecotourism, advocates claim that large-scale protected areas actively promote eco-tourism in mega-parks (Duffy, 1997). Historically, many national borders are in remote hinterlands far from the capital or major cities and have correspondingly lower levels of development (Duffy, 2001). Often these are the same reasons that the land is ecologically important. Transboundary protected areas and transboundary natural resource management (TBNRM), more broadly, are also viewed by many as simply the latest “hot” natural resource management trend. With the failure to achieve wildly optimistic goals in a variety of challenging settings, conservation organizations and their financial supporters have shifted funding from integrated conservation-development programs (ICDPs) (Wells and Brandon, 1992) to community-based conservation and then community-based natural resource management (CBNRM) (Western and Wright, 1994; Kellert et al., 2000). Transboundary natural resource management is simply the latest extension. Donor imperatives are driving the budget and the

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money needs to be used. What happens when the next fad hits or when TBNRM fails to live up to lofty expectations is still open for conjecture.

In addition to the role of transboundary protected areas in promoting ecotourism, advocates also claim that TBPAs serve to foster regional and/or rural economic development. Young (2006) notes a couple of the problems with promoting rural economies through

conservation. First, it is often unclear whether wildlife conservation provides the best financial returns on land use. Some studies find that it outperforms other land uses in the southern African lowveld (Child, 2006). Other studies see certain types of agriculture outgaining wildlife

conservation (Young, 2006). One land use option that seems to be profitable in parts of South Africa is game farming, raising specific species to help restock game reserves and protected areas in the region. It is unclear if this option would work for local communities or not. A significant challenge lies in profit distribution. As experiences with CAMPFIRE show, even in very

profitable regions (in CAMPFIRE’s case, profitable hunting concessions) the amount of earnings on a household or per capita basis often drop to such low numbers (<$10/year) that they don’t compensate for the loss in resource access and usage or enable a move from a direct resource usage economy to a fully monetized system (Metcalfe, 1994; Metcalfe, 2004). Many ecotourism or game farming options provide wonderful salaries for a few skilled workers and owners, but fail to provide sufficient jobs or economic returns for an entire community. The same type of project that creates a great deal of wealth for private owners may prove to be too small when attempting to spread the rewards throughout a community. Past experience indicates that the “benefits” of a protected area to a community often result in a community dance troupe or a small curio market for tourists (South African consultant, 11/8/2006). Neither of these provides a major income source for most community members.

The second point that Young makes is that rural population dynamics are undergoing radical changes with urbanization resulting in plummeting rural populations in much of sub- Saharan Africa, particularly in South Africa. While the author does not advocate resettlement, he questions whether policies to foster development in a declining population are the best use of limited financial resources. If conservation programs link with development plans, it may prove counterproductive to conservation by providing incentives for people to remain in an area or to move there to take advantage of development initiatives when they would otherwise choose to leave. The argument does not deny the imperative to help people in need. Nor does it intend to denigrate traditional lifestyles or rural cultures. Instead, it advocates policies that take advantage of structural changes in the political economy rather than trying to fight against them.

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A further challenge to stimulating rural economies through community-based tourism emerges from the skills required to compete in the hypercompetitive tourism market. Private sector tourism agencies often have the size to compete in a global ecotourism market, the connections to tap into marketing campaigns worldwide, and the business acumen to win customers and make profits. The capitalist incentive system of private sector tourism provides clearly articulated goals of profitability. Public- and community-run tourism groups do not have such clear objectives. Community lodges, for instance, must balance profitability to be shared community-wide with job creation goals. Additionally, the skills necessary to run an ecotourism operation generally do not exist in rural communities. Restaurant wait staffs may have never eaten in a restaurant, and hotel staff may have never stayed in a hotel. It makes it difficult to acquire the service skills, let alone the professional business management skills, marketing expertise, required connection with outside tourism programs, and the financial backing to succeed. This is not to say that it cannot be achieved or that community-based tourism programs will not work, only that it will be difficult. Communities can overcome all of these deficiencies through government training programs, initiatives like the South African College for Tourism, and subsidized projects. Community-based tourism projects can also succeed with communal- private partnerships such as the Makuleke-Wilderness Safaris partnership in the Pafuri Lodge, located in the Pafuri region of the Kruger National Park (www.wilderness-safaris.com).

However, for every Pafuri Lodge success, several underfunded, poorly staffed community-based lodges exist. The meager existence created by many of these does not support the “development through conservation” argument so frequently given.

An additional challenge facing community-based tourism enterprises in the Great Limpopo and the Kgalagadi comes from the pre-existing tourism infrastructure. In the Kgalagadi, the primary animal viewing areas lie along the two riverbeds. Both rivers already have several camps along them. This limits further infrastructure development within the park. Even excluding community interests, the Kgalagadi already struggles to provide better

opportunities for Botswana, as South Africa has built lodges at the top sites over the past 70 years. Although the Botswana section of the park comprises 2/3 of the total area, the Nossob River forms the national boundary and serves as one of the few areas where wildlife can be routinely found. The transfrontier park continues to struggle to balance the tourism goals of the two parks (DWNP staff interview, 3/29/2007). Recently SANParks worked with the local San and Mier communities to open a community-owned lodge on the co-managed contractual park of the communities. Even this concession, in the contractual park on a beautiful landscape, still faces a hard battle to become financial sustainable. It should prevail, but it is not clear how

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extendable this business model can be. In the Great Limpopo, the South African side is approaching the limits to further tourism offerings. Kruger National Park is approaching its tourism capacity with 1.3 million visitors annually (SANParks tourism, 5/18/2007). In addition to the park’s limits, the hostelry industry in the area already has an overabundance of lodging options, particularly at the five-star level (SANParks executive, 2/13/2007). The ramifications for community-based projects are two-fold. First, they face high levels of competition at all price points. Second, if they choose to drop to a lower price-point, say a three-star lodge instead of a five-star, the size of the project required to earn similar profit goes up exponentially. For a community project, attempting to provide sustenance for a group of people this is the worst of both worlds. It requires a bigger up-front investment, a larger ecological footprint, and, ultimately, may not make the necessary operating profit.

The opportunities in Mozambique and Zimbabwe both provide different dilemmas and prospects in the GLTP than across the border in South Africa. In Mozambique, development in and around the park is immature and underdeveloped, at best. The infrastructure within the park is rough, which can be good or bad for tourism, depending on the style, although rugged camping typically has less profitability. The one current concessionaire in Mozambique struggles to deal with government bureaucracy and the challenges of pioneering businesses in an underdeveloped setting. The community lodges in the area both suffer from lack of training, insufficient levels of tourism for profitability, and lack of supporting infrastructure from the government and other businesses and services in terms of roads, restaurants, and other amenities. The case for development in Zimbabwe, likewise, has waxed and waned over the past twenty years due to ongoing political events. In the past, tourism infrastructure in Gonarezhou National Park and the surrounding conservation areas offered a range of options from rustic campgrounds to high-end lodges (Saunders, 2005). Additionally, luxury resorts and safari outfits worked in and around the southeast lowveld of Zimbabwe. Current political and economic conditions in Zimbabwe have wreaked havoc, and all but a few of these lodges have since ceased to exist. Holiday options are now limited to camping and lower level lodging, and turmoil in civil society has eliminated almost all tourism in Zimbabwe, excluding border crossings around Victoria Falls in the Northwest. Tourism ventures in Mozambique and Zimbabwe may exceed expectations in the future, but current prospects appear more limited than many claims.

One further challenge that the transboundary parks face in attempting to stimulate rural economic development involves resource access and usage (Jones, 2005). Because the creation of a protected area often reshapes local land tenure arrangements, often bringing communally held land under the jurisdiction of the state, access to resource bases may be limited

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(Ramutsindela, 2003). In southern Africa, these resources include firewood, medicinal plants, game (both hunting and fishing), fodder and rangeland for livestock, and building materials, among others. Reduced access to these materials often further complicates the induced switch from a subsistence rural livelihood to a money-based service economy. Without the safety net of traditional resources from within the protected area, local communities struggle to survive without outside intervention. Changes in land tenure by fiat may not be understood and are often difficult to enforce. Re-gazetting of land as a protected area has resulted in paper parks around the world and does little for conservation initiatives or improved rural livelihoods (Brandon et al., 1998).

The economic case for transboundary conservation has many strong arguments in its favor. Advocates provide examples of beneficial increases in ecotourism and of stimulus for rural economies. However, these benefits do not always occur and often bring problems along – problems of shifting land tenure, reduced resource access, and induced changes to rural

livelihoods. While transboundary protected areas may make a valid economic case for their creation, we should take care before adopting yet another development panacea. Before returning to look at some of the unique challenges that transboundary protected areas create, it is imperative that we examine one more topic that will draw us away from the ecological concerns for

conservation – environmental peace-making.