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Nawa 9 |
Feb 26 2002 |
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AMBASSADOR MCGUIRE VISITS KUNENE CONSERVANCY PROGRAM
 Ambassador Kevin McGuire, along USAID staff, traveled to Namibia’s breathtakingly beautiful Kunene Region to explore progress being made under the community based resource management program that USAID supports through the World Wildlife Foundation. The first stop was at the Twyfelfontein Country Lodge, an upscale facility built through a joint venture between Uibasen Conservancy and the private sector investor, Namibia Country Lodges. The lodge has 110 beds and the Conservancy receives a 10 percent levy for each bed occupied. Moreover, the lodge employs 70 people, most of whom come from villages in the conservancy. The Chair of the Conservancy, Elias Xoabub and the Managing Director of Country Lodges, Willem de Wet declared the joint venture a `win-win situation`.
The delegation then visited the Torra Conservancy where they met with the newly elected conservancy management committee. |
The committee was proud of the highly popular tent camp it owns in partnership with Wildlife Safaris and the fact that Lina Florry, a woman from the community, is now taking over management of the camp. Committee members also boasted of the rebounding wildlife populations that are occurring in their area and attributed the increases to the fact that community residents now have a stake in protecting the wildlife and can afford game guards to ensure that proper protection is provided. Early the morning after the meeting, the game guards took the Ambassador on a tracking expedition, the highlight of which was spotting a black rhino, a rare species which roams freely only in Namibia. Like their colleagues in Uibasen, the Torra Conservancy is financially self-sufficient and its bank account is swelling to the point at which in can make social investments in the community. Recently it donated US $2,000 to the local school.
Of the 15 registered conservancies nation-wide, nine are in the Kunene region. Another 13 communities in Kunene are in the developmental stages of registering. According to Margaret Jacobsohn, co-director of the IRDNC, a local NGO assisting the conservancies, Kunene will soon be "a protected area where wildlife can roam throughout the whole region, just like they did 100 years ago." |
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USAID SUPPORT LEADS TO US$6 MILLION COTTON JOINT VENTURE
A US$6 million joint venture agreement was signed between the Namibian company, Jireh Ginning Namibia (Pty) Ltd. and its U.S. counterpart, Chihuahua Cotton & Cattle, Inc. The agreement, which will establish Namibia’s first cotton ginning operation and create value-added products, marks the first successful deal signed under USAID’s Global Technology Network (GTN) activity. The agreement was negotiated with a view to supply cotton lint and other byproducts from the ginning process to export and local markets. The joint venture has been set up as a 40% U.S. owned 60% Namibian owned corporation, which plans to set up the first gin near Grootfontein. The gin will process long fiber seed cotton purchased from farmers throughout northern Namibia and process this seed cotton into high quality cotton lint. Cottonseed, a byproduct of the ginning process, will be sold back to the farmers for planting in the next season.
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Since Independence, Namibia’s production of cotton has increased markedly and is expected to grow to 15,000 tonnes by 2004. Currently, all of this production is exported to South Africa where it is ginned into cotton lint that is then sold to textile mills there and elsewhere. Namibian farmers then purchase their cottonseed for the next year’s crop from those cotton gins. This has two potential exposures for Namibia. First, the country is losing out on the value added contribution of the ginning process and, second, Namibia has no control over the quality of seeds made available from South Africa.
The joint venture deal requires 30% shareholding by Namibian farmers and US$500,000-700,000 to be spent on training and technical assistance to be provided to more than 1000 participating communal farmers, and includes a provision that 3% of profits will go into a communal trust for scholarships and community development activities.
Global Technology Network (GTN) provided support in identifying the Namibian company’s business needs and then provided trade leads through their GTN system. It also provided a GTN Travel Grant in order for the two companies to meet, as well as facilitated the JV negotiations.
USAID/Namibia is involved in setting up national consultative workshops with various stakeholders in the project. The African Development Foundation has expressed interest in funding related grassroots community development with a grant of up to US$200,000. The U.S. Embassy Economic/Commercial Section in Namibia provided advice and counseling to the U.S. partner, Chihuahua Cotton & Cattle, Inc. |
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AWARDS CEREMONY FOR PRIMARY SCHOOL IMPROVEMENT GRANTS PROJECT
 On February 4, 2002, an awards ceremony was held in northern Namibia to recognize several communities that had received grants sponsored by USAID`s School Improvement Grants project. The ceremony, held at the new Trade Center in Ongwediva, was attended by an impressive group of government and traditional leaders including the Minister of Basic Education, John Mutorwa; King Kauluma of the Ondangwa and Chair of the National Traditional Council; regional governors; two mayors of the local towns; senior-level education officials; as well as hundreds of community members from the surrounding villages.
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Ambassador Kevin McGuire and the Minister made the presentation jointly on behalf of the project which falls under USAID`s Basic Education Support-II (BES-II) project, and is designed to promote greater parental and community involvement in their children`s education. Fifty-five communities from Namibia`s northern regions had submitted proposals and twelve awards of approximately US$5000 each were made at the ceremony. In his keynote speech, Minister Mutorwa said that the current challenge is to empower the school unit--including parents, teachers and all others--and to nurture and inculcate democratic values amongst the various stakeholders. He pointed out that the recipient communities were examples of the close collaboration needed between parents and school staff to improve education for Namibia`s children.
The projects receiving the awards included community-based HIV/AIDS awareness activities, a teacher`s material development unit, a school library, an environmental awareness center, and an agriculture project. The communities receiving the awards entertained all with music and dance. The event received wide media attention on national television and radio and in the three Namibian newspapers.
The BES II project is administered by the Academy for Educational Development. The Rossing Foundation, a local NGO, administers the School Improvement Grants project through a sub-contract to AED. |
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