Our approach

Collaborative management for multiple benefits

Landscape management by landscape members

The Greater Mudumu Landscape is managed under a co-management approach whereby there is high-level consensus amongst all stakeholders on developing an overall vision, objectives and targets that will be to the greater good of all stakeholders, achieved through the implementation of an agreed Co-management and Development Plan.

Vision

The Vision of the Mudumu Landscape Association is to promote, support and facilitate the collaborative management and development of the Mudumu Landscape for enhanced landscape and biodiversity conservation and socio-economic development.

Purpose

The Purpose of the Mudumu Landscape Association is to foster and enhance collaboration by the members, synergistic planning and implementation of the Vision, Objectives and Principles contained in the Constitution and the Collaborative management and Development Plan as may be developed and revised and updated from time to time, within the area comprising the Mudumu Landscape.

Management framework

Our approach is outlined in the Constitution of the Mudumu Landscape Association.

NamParks Project

This project has a clear goal and objective to see the North Eastern Parks contribute not only to local and trans-boundary conservation, but also to local economic development and the improvement of rural livelihoods. The North Eastern Parks are critical for the sustainability of conservancies in the north-east of Namibia, which are generally too small to be viable as core areas for wildlife breeding and utilisation purposes. Also the North Eastern parks are unsustainable without good relationships with their neighbours and residents (in the case of Bwabwata National Park), or if areas outside of parks are left undeveloped with high levels of poverty and heavily depleted natural resources. For this reason an integrated approach to park management and regional development is required.

The logframe in the Phase-3 Separate Agreement proposes the following broad results:

1. Infrastructure and park management of the North Eastern Parks is improved.
2. Provisions are made for resident and neighbour friendly park management by MET
3. Structures are established to increase the income from park-related activities of communities neighbouring the North Eastern parks
4. The MET is strengthened in their role in the establishment of KAZA TFCA.
5. The MET Project Management Team is supported.

How does Mudumu Landscape fit into the national context?

State owned protected areas

Namibia has over the years become a world leader in pursuing conservation initiatives. Remarkable achievements have taken place in the conservation of Namibia’s biodiversity and safeguarding ecological integrity of our ecosystems. To date, our country boasts 20 state-run protected areas that represent nearly 17% of the total land area. Most of these parks are world renowned for their uniqueness as tourism destinations and for their species richness.

• 20 state-run protected areas
• nearly 17% of the total land area

Communal Conservancies

Complementing the network of protected areas are communal conservancies and private land used for conservation. To date, Namibia has 86 registered conservancies covering almost 20% of the country while the private land used for conservation represents slightly over 6% of the country land surface. A growing demand to create more conservancies across the country is an indication of the Ministry of Environment and Tourism's Community-Based Natural Resource Management programme’s successes.

• 86 registered communal conservancies
• over 19% of the total land area

Therefore Government, communities and private sector, in total have close to half of the country, an astonishing 42% earmarked for conservation. This is a remarkable achievement. However,  setting land aside for conservation without putting appropriate measures to manage effectively will not safeguard our biodiversity. It is against this background that the Ministry is consciously and continuously exploring new ways to improve management effectiveness through new initiatives especially those that provide positive incentives to conserve biodiversity.

Landscapes

Under the Nam-Place Project five landscape initiatives are underway to ensure that: protected landscape conservation areas are established, land uses in areas adjacent to existing Protected Areas is compatible with biodiversity conservation objectives; corridors are established to sustain the viability of wildlife populations. The landscapes are:

1. Mudumu Landscape
2. Greater Waterberg Landscape
3. Windhoek Green Belt Landscape
4. Greater Sossusvlei-Namib Landscape
5. Greater Fish River Canyon Landscape

This brings an additional 15,550 km² of land under protected landscapes management arrangements.