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ENVIRONMENT
The Kavango-Zambezi Transfrontier
Conservation Area
(Kaza) is an extraordinary
intergovernmental effort to
create a wildlife park across huge swathes
of land where Angola, Botswana, Namibia,
Zambia and Zimbabwe converge.
The aim is to protect the biodiversity
and culture in this corner of southern
Africa without regard to borders.
Angola owns the second-biggest slice
of the proposed protected area, which at
444,000sq km is the size of Sweden. Kaza is
named after the two largest river systems
that drain the region, the Okavango
and Zambezi. The area is home to the
world’s biggest elephant population and a
wealth of other endangered plant and
animal species.
The project is not only about the welfare
of the flora and fauna. Kaza member
countries are expecting an explosion of
tourism in the area, which will hopefully
boost socio-economic development and
conserve local cultures.
Angola is responsible for the second-
largest section of the area, some
90,000sq km. This covers the Luiana Partial
Reserve, the Mavinga Partial Reserve, and
the Longa-Mavinga, Luengue, Luiana and
Mucusso hunting areas.
Kuando Kubango province forms the
project’s starting point in Angola. From
there, it crosses the border to Botswana
and continues towards Botswana’s
Okavango Delta.
“The vast wilderness of Angola’s Luiana
and Luenge national parks and adjacent
areas with near-pristine wildlife habitats
offers unexploited tourism development
potential,” Kaza director Dr Victor
Siamudaala told Universo when asked to
name Angola’s most vital contribution to
the project, adding that “Angola’s unique
culture and cuisine, too, are particularly
attractive to tourists.”
Official birth
The first steps of the Kaza project date
back to the 1990s, with the establishment
of the Okavango Upper Zambezi Tourism
Initiative funded through the South African
Development Community. The project
failed to take off and was succeeded by
others, until the foundation stone of the
current Kaza scheme was laid in December
2006 when the five member countries
signed a memorandum of understanding.
Its formal establishment took place in
August 2011 when the leaders of Angola,
Botswana, Namibia, Zambia and Zimbabwe
signed the Kaza Treaty in Luanda, at the
closing ceremony of the 31st SADC (Southern
African Development Community) Summit.
“For five countries to come together
and decide to mutually conserve
their natural resources in a
sustainable way and benefit local
communities and eventually reduce
rural poverty is truly admirable”
– Dr Victor Siamudaala
Kaza was officially launched in March
2012 at the Namibian town of Katima
Mulilo. The project is jointly administered
by the governments of the five partner
countries and is supported by various
international donors. The co-ordinating
role of Kaza rotates biannually between
the five nations.
“For five countries to come together
and decide to mutually conserve their
natural resources in a sustainable way and
benefit local communities and eventually
reduce rural poverty is truly admirable,”
said Dr Siamudaala.
Elephants
One of the most spectacular aspects of
the Kaza project is that it will harbour
the largest contiguous population of the
African elephant (around 250,000) on the
continent. Southern Africa’s elephants
face two important issues: poaching –
they are much sought after for their ivory
– and overpopulation in areas where they
infringe on farmland.
Botswana drew up a plan in 1990, which
put the maximum number of elephants
the country could handle at 60,000. But
because culling was controversial and
Botswana wanted to avoid international
condemnation, it allowed numbers to grow.
There are now some 150,000 elephants
in Botswana, which are in dire need of
an alternative habitat. Zambia, and in
particular the Angolan province of Kuando
Kubango, offer a way of diluting these
populations through Kaza ‘transfrontier
corridors’ or protected tracts of land.
Angola’s 199,049sq km Kuando
Kubango province will make up a major
portion of the reserve. After four decades
of independence and civil war, which
ended in 2002, it had only around 140,000
people living there. The conflict took a
heavy toll on the province’s wildlife, as
elephant ivory was sold to buy weapons
and other wild animals served as food
for soldiers and farmers. Now Kaza offers
Kuando Kubango a promising new future.
With its continuing landmine clearance
campaigns, the province could provide a
vast new home for Botswana’s superfluous
elephant population.
34 SONANGOL UNIVERSO DECEMBER 2012 35
Mark Clydesdale BZO
Simon Greig
wollemipine
Eland antelope, a native of the Okavango region