the role of tourism in natural resource management in the okavango ...

ural communities. Final decisions over key resources remain the responsibility of
government, for example, as the hunting quotas are determined by the Department
of Wildlife and National Parks without the involvement of the rural communities.
Despite these limitations, it is important to note that government policies and the
zoning of the country into WMAs and CHAs for CBNRM purposes indicate the
project has had some success. Rozemeijer and van der Jagt (2000) note that key
achievements made by CBNRM include the fact that the DWNP has laid down
comprehensive legislation and implementation guidelines in support of CBNRM in
the country, and that a nationwide land use zoning exercise has realigned the
boundaries of wildlife (hunting) and other natural resource areas to conform to major
land use zones and create economically and ecologically viable land units (Mbaiwa,
2004).
WMAs, however, also bring along development constraints. For example, agriculture
is subject to restrictions within WMAs, as no livestock boreholes are permitted
outside the community zones of the WMAs, and regulations for each WMA contains
maximum livestock numbers. As such, WMAs have a profound impact on the
livelihood opportunities of the local population, and as many of the WMAs in
Botswana, as a result of range-degradation and the over utilisation of resources, are
resource-poor areas, one wonders to what extent WMAs are able to improve local
livelihoods (Artzen, 2003).
This question needs to be considered within the long-term development perspective
as articulated within Vision 2016. Vision 2016 was launched in 1996 and it
formulated ambitious and challenging development targets for the country. These
include the eradication of absolute poverty by the Year 2016. This means that all
Batswana should be able to meet their basic needs and live above the poverty
datum line. To achieve this objective, the per capita income needs to triple, requiring
an annual economic growth rate of eight percent in real terms (i.e. excluding
inflation). Given the widespread poverty in WMAs, incomes in these areas need to
increase much faster, probably by around 15 to 20 percent per annum. To achieve
this, a rapid and sustained increase in wildlife benefits is essential. WMAs have to
demonstrate the economic value of natural resources, particularly wildlife, and their
income generating capacity for the local population. This poses an enormous
development challenge to WMAs because consumptive use of wildlife is generally
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