SOUTHERN AFRICAN PEACE PARKS

Great Limpopo Transfrontier Park

Overview

Parks | landscape [© 2009 Koos van der Lende]

Vision

To achieve inter-state collaboration in the conservation of transboundary ecosystems and their associated biodiversity, promoting sustainable use of natural resources to improve the quality of life of the peoples of Mozambique, South Africa and Zimbabwe.

Mission

To collaboratively establish and manage on a sustainable basis a viable Great Limpopo Transfrontier Park with full stakeholder participation, including local communities, fostering regional cooperation, biodiversity conservation, and cross-border socio-economic development.

Objectives

Political borders very rarely respect ecological systems, and the Transfrontier Park will strive to re-establish historical animal migration routes and other ecosystem functions disrupted by fences and incompatible legislation. This more natural ecosystem will then also be jointly managed according to harmonised wildlife management policies, promoting the return of a larger and more resilient ecosystem with greater chances of long-term sustainability. Equally important, this park will provide jobs and revenue generating opportunities for many of the thousands of local people affected by decades of civil war. Improving the lives of these rural communities will in turn further contribute towards biodiversity conservation by demonstrating the economic and social advantages that can be achieved through wildlife conservation.

Parks | people [© 2009 Heinrich van den Berg]

The broad objectives for the establishment of the Great Limpopo Transfrontier Park are to:

  • foster transnational collaboration and cooperation between Mozambique, South Africa and Zimbabwe in implementing ecosystem management, through the establishment, development and management of the Great Limpopo Transfrontier Park
  • promote alliances in the management of biological natural resources by encouraging social, economic and other partnerships among the parties, private sector, local communities and NGO's;
  • enhance ecosystem integrity and natural ecological processes by harmonising environmental management procedures across international boundaries and striving to remove artificial barriers impeding the natural movement of animals;
  • develop frameworks and strategies whereby local communities can participate in, and tangibly benefit from, the management and sustainable use of natural resources that occur within the Transfrontier Park or TFCA;
  • facilitate the establishment and maintenance of a subregional economic base by way of appropriate development frameworks, strategies and work plans; and
  • develop transborder ecotourism as a means for fostering regional socio-economic development.

Name (origin, background)

The Great Limpopo Transfrontier Park, website http://www.greatlimpopopark.com/, is made up of three core national constituents:

Before the Great Limpopo Transfrontier Park was formally launched representatives from the three nations had to decide on the proper name for what will be one of the world's greatest game reserves.

The name “Gaza TFCA” has at times been used to describe the area proposed for transfrontier park development. Motivation for this has been that much of the area overlaps with the historic “Gaza-nkulu” kingdom of Soshangane, thus lending itself to various possibilities such as “Gaza-nkulu” itself, “Greater Gazaland”, “Gazaland”, or simply “Gaza”. However, reservations have been expressed that using the name “Gaza” as root for the Transfrontier Park name may offend some current-day cultural groupings (Venda, Swazi, etc) who may reject this insinuation of historic ethnic land associations and dominance. Public discussion and participation in selection of a name was therefore essential, and for the interim period the neutral name of Gaza-Kruger-Gonarezhou Transfrontier Park was used. A ministerial committee finally decided on the name Great Limpopo Transfrontier Park.