Land beneficiaries as game farmers: conservation, land reform and the invention of the ‘community game farm’ in KwaZulu-Natal

Ngubane, Mnqobi; Brooks, Shirley

doi:10.1080/02589001.2013.811790

Cited by 24 publications

(7 citation statements)

References 19 publications

Supporting

Mentioning

Contrasting

Order By: Relevance

“…In adopting a nodal approach, the NBES extends earlier phases of conservation territorialization that have been explored in the literature and which involved the private sector, private landowners and traditional authorities into expanded, postcolonial Protected Area networks. These include the incorporation and consolidation of buffer zones, 'conservation corridors', private nature reserves and game farms, and adjacent communal land (Beinart and Coates 1995;Brandt and Spierenburg, 2014;Spierenburg and Brooks, 2014;Kamuti, 2014;Ngubane and Brooks, 2013). Recent conservation territory expansion initiatives like the Biodiversity Stewardship program (Cockburn et al, 2019;Wright et al, 2018), and Other Effective Conservation Measures (OECMs), are also part of bioeconomy nodal development.…”

Section: Neoliberal Conservation and Biodiversity Economymentioning

confidence: 99%

Biodiversity Economy and conservation territorialization: a pyrrhic strategy in Kwazulu-Natal

Nel

2021

Journal of Political Ecology

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

Post-apartheid Kwazulu-Natal is in the midst of ecological and social crises related to land ownership, resource control, minerals extraction, environmental degradation and biodiversity loss. The environs of the Hluhluwe-Imfolozi National Park are a violent environment, where the immediate violence of an anti-poaching 'war' waged over fears of Rhinoceros extinction, is counter-posed to the slow violence permeating the lives of marginal rural residents affected by the externalities of coal mining. A range of struggles are waged against these challenges, but a hegemonic 'Biodiversity Economy' intervention has arisen, attended by projects aimed at territorializing conservation space and multiple-win scenarios. Based on four years of intermittent research in the area, this article critiques the territorialization of conservation, project outcomes, and commercialization efforts within the Umfozi Biodiversity Economy Node (UBEN). I contend that a biodiversity economy nodal approach extends neoliberal conservation strategies, and functions as a spatial aggregator to reterritorialize conservation land use over space and time. However, the findings suggest that, despite years of energy and investment there have only been limited individual successes in the UBEN, and a range of frustrations, compounded by COVID-19 complications. The analysis also highlights further costs and externalities of the initiative: as the UBEN exacerbates underlying tensions in Kwazulu-Natal's uneven conservation geography, and it aligns with problematic and often unrepresentative traditional authority structures and related accumulation networks. It is also complicit with the production of sacrificial spaces at the conservation-extraction nexus.In this context, I argue the UBEN is pyrrhic; that is, an outcome or goal strived for/achieved at too little reward and too high a cost. The article extends political-ecological critique of neoliberal conservation and the green economy to incorporate the framing and implementation of biodiversity economy nodal approaches – and their uneven and pyrrhic effects – in contested, crisis-ridden conservation contexts.

show abstract

Section: Neoliberal Conservation and Biodiversity Economymentioning

confidence: 99%

Biodiversity Economy and conservation territorialization: a pyrrhic strategy in Kwazulu-Natal

Nel

2021

Journal of Political Ecology

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

show abstract

“…Planners and policy-makers thus frequently fail to understand the particularities of the claimant histories involved. See: Ngubane and Brooks (2013) for further comments on this phenomenon and arguments as to why a more nuanced view is needed. 93…”

Section: Deff (2017) 91mentioning

confidence: 99%

Game On! Understanding the Emerging Game Meat Value Chain in South Africa

Khumalo¹,

Sommerville²,

Brooks³

et al. 2021

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

Game farming (wildlife ranching is a related term) constitutes an increasingly important land use in rural South Africa. This Guidance Memo traces efforts to formalize and increase the production of game meat in the sector, following a period of game farming expansion and, in some instances, intensification. We consider the game industry's intersection with hunting, game breeding, ecotourism, and processed game products, in a context where growing concerns about biodiversity loss globally are drawing new attention to the sector.Diverse changes related to breeding practices, farm conversions and new investment patterns, hunting norms, and the emergence of community game farms through land reform are resulting in increasing game populations, even as a recent collapse in game prices and economic shut-downs associated with COVID-19 have destabilized game operations. The industry is now at a crossroads, when efforts to expand and formalize the game meat value chain are gathering momentum as a possible way forward.We highlight key gaps in the regulatory framework for game meat production and reflect on the concerns that an expanded value chain may raise with respect to socio-economic development and racial transformation, environmental sustainability, and human health and animal welfare. The Memo culminates in six recommendations for front-line persons and policy makers, intended to ensure that future developments with respect to game meat production occur in an inclusive, sustainable, safe and ethical manner.Although we had several conversations with Wildlife Ranching South Africa about our research, they did not confirm their interest in participating in the project.

show abstract

“…In KwaZulu-Natal game farms have been subjected to land claims. Some claims were settled through the allocation of alternative land, in other cases land was returned, and the land reform beneficiaries were strongly advised to continue with this new form of land usewith little success, as it requires quite a lot of running capital (Ngubane andBrooks 2013, Kamuti 2016).…”

Section: Government's Ambivalent Responses and Webs Of Powermentioning

confidence: 99%

Living on Other People’s Land; Impacts of Farm Conversions to Game Farming on Farm Dwellers’ Abilities to Access Land in the Eastern Cape, South Africa

Spierenburg

2019

Society & Natural Resources

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

This contribution analyses the impacts of conversions of commercial mainly white-ownedfarms to wildlife-based production on access to land for farm workers and dwellers in South Africa. They depended on informal arrangements with landowners for access, hence the notions of 'abilities to access' and 'bundles of power' are more appropriate concepts to analyze their access than bundles of rights. In post-apartheid South Africa, the state attempted to formalize farm dwellers' land rights, but simultaneously deregulated the agricultural sector, which stimulated land concentration and land investments, and changed social relations on commercial farms. These contradictory interventions impact negatively on farm dwellers' abilities to access to land on commercial farms. The paper furthermore demonstrates that conversions to wildlife-based production constitute one response by landowners to the changes in the agricultural sector, but also play a role in struggles about identity and belonging in post-apartheid South Africa.

show abstract

Land beneficiaries as game farmers: conservation, land reform and the invention of the ‘community game farm’ in KwaZulu-Natal

Cited by 24 publications

References 19 publications

Biodiversity Economy and conservation territorialization: a pyrrhic strategy in Kwazulu-Natal

Biodiversity Economy and conservation territorialization: a pyrrhic strategy in Kwazulu-Natal

Game On! Understanding the Emerging Game Meat Value Chain in South Africa

Living on Other People’s Land; Impacts of Farm Conversions to Game Farming on Farm Dwellers’ Abilities to Access Land in the Eastern Cape, South Africa

Contact Info

Product

Resources

About