the richtersveld cultural and botanical landscape - SAHRA

Richtersveld Cultural and Botanical Landscape World Heritage Site Nomination 107
community were to have the communal lands placed under the ownership of the
local municipality or under a Community Property Association. In the case of the
Richtersveld communal land the community voted overwhelmingly to retain
ownership of their land that would be formalised by way of a Community Property
Association structure and in 2001 the Sida !Hub Community Property Association
(referred to as the “CPA”) was created constituting every adult member of the four
Richtersveld towns of Eksteenfontein, Kuboes, Lekkersing and Sandrift (adult
members of the community are those over the age of 18 who have lived in any of
the towns for five years or more). Thus the ownership of the Richtersveld
Community Conservancy resides with the entire community, and formal title holding
is expecting to be transferred to the CPA from the Minister of the Department of
Land Affairs in the near future.
The CPA is currently represented by a committee of elected members of the
community. Decisions of land use are taken by the CPA and close relations are
maintained with local government (the Richtersveld Municipality), as well as with
District and Provincial governments. People residing in and around the
Conservancy area, primarily the Nama and Bosluis Baster pastoralists are
members of the CPA and thus landowners themselves. The Conservancy is
comprised of one contiguous protected area of approximately 160,000 hectares.
Additionally, the Nababiep (helskloof) Provincial Nature Reserve borders on the
Conservancy’s eastern boundary and is to be transferred from the Northern Cape
Province’s Department of Tourism, Environment and Conservation (DTEC) to the
CPA for inclusion in the Conservancy. This is a testament to the success of the
Richtersveld Community Conservancy.
Buffer zones surrounding the Conservancy are comprised mainly of two types of
ownership. The Richtersveld National Park on the northern boundary is also part of
the Richtersveld communal area and hence is owned by the Richtersveld Sida !hub
CPA, and is co-managed by the community and the South African National Parks
(SANParks) through the Richtersveld Gemeenskaplike Bestuurskomitee, known as
the RGBK and roughly translated as the Richtersveld Communal Management
Committee. The Communal Grazing Area bordering the Conservancy to the West,