 |
|
|
|
|
[an error occurred while processing this directive]
This is an archived USAID document retained on this web site as a matter of public record.
DIALOGUE
In this section:
Mission of the Month: Namibia
Notes from Natsios
Mission of the Month: Namibia
 |
|
Namibia is home to the world’s largest population
of cheetahs—about 2,500. Their numbers have been
increasing with the help of conservancies.
G. Holberman |
Challenge
Namibia is an arid country in southwestern Africa and is half
the size of Alaska. It has a democratic government, good infrastructure,
and abundant natural resources. Mining, fishing, and tourism
fuel the economy, but most people eke out their living from
subsistence agriculture.
Namibia was the world’s first country to incorporate
environmental protection in its constitution. Today, some
14 percent of the country is covered by protected areas that
are full of wildlife. As more land is protected, it becomes
increasingly important to help rural communities living within
and near conservation areas to profit from protecting the
land and its resources.
USAID Innovative Approach
Since 1992, the Agency has supported the development of community
structures to conserve but also profit from the biologically
rich environment. Working through the Namibian government,
the World Wildlife Fund, and a network of local NGOs, USAID
helped to form communal conservancies that have the authority
to manage wildlife.
Members from each conservancy elect a committee to oversee
the development and management of communal resources. This
process gives a voice to women and men who otherwise might
have little impact on local governance decisions.
Conservancies earn significant income by entering into joint
ventures with private investors to establish safari lodges
or by negotiating trophy hunting concession agreements. Individuals
also earn money from making and selling local arts and crafts.
Except for such personal income, earnings at conservancies
are pooled. A portion of the income goes toward community
projects like schools, clinics, or roads. The rest may be
distributed to the individual residents as a dividend of conservancy
membership.
“Given their structural organization, conservancies
are great avenues through which we can get out the word on
HIV/AIDS awareness or civic education in rural areas,”
said Tina Dooley-Jones, USAID/Namibia’s director of technical
programs.
Under its 2004–2010 strategy for Namibia, USAID is
expanding from conservancy wildlife management to community
oversight of a broader set of natural resources, including
forests, fisheries, and grazing land. The Agency is also emphasizing
business development skills and training projects for income-earning
activities.
Since 1992, USAID has invested $35.5 million in this program,
which has been matched by a larger sum from private investors
and other donors through 2004.
 |
|
Game guards on the job at Nyae Nyae Conservancy. The
third man is holding a global positioning system, used
to count and track wildlife.
USAID/Namibia |
Results
The 31 registered conservancies earned $2.35 million last
year. Four of them are now financially self-sustaining, while
six more are expected to earn lofty profits by 2006.
Almost 100,000 Namibians reside in conservancies, and some
3,800 people are employed as game guards, hunters, artisans,
or customer service personnel at lodges and campsites.
The registered conservancies protect some 20 million acres
of communal land, which is in addition to 28 million acres
already protected by the government.
USAID/Namibia Mission Director Gary Newton said that “by
the end of our support to Namibia’s conservancies in
2010, some 15,000,000 hectares, or 18 percent of Namibia’s
land mass, will be under a sustainable system of natural resource
management, and biodiversity will have been greatly enhanced.”
Torra Conservancy, the first to become self-sufficient,
distributed about $75 to every conservancy member in 2003,
an amount equal to half their annual incomes. The following
year, the conservancy was one of six winners of an international
prize from the United Nations Development Program. This year,
the Damaraland Camp, a safari lodge located within the conservancy,
won the Tourism for Tomorrow Conservation Award 2005 at a
global tourism summit, an award recognizing the world’s
best practices in responsible tourism.
Wildlife, which suffered heavy losses from poaching until
the mid 1990s, is coming back. There are now more elephants,
oryx, buffalo, Hartmann’s zebra, springbok, and lions
than ever before. Namibia also has the world’s largest
free-roaming population of black rhinos, and their numbers
have doubled in the northern Kunene region over the last 12
years. The country is also home to 2,500 cheetahs, the world’s
largest population of the big cats.
Game donations, primarily from private farms and government,
have helped conservancies increase wildlife populations, reflecting
a growing confidence in the ability of the conservancies to
be good shepherds of the environment, said Dooley-Jones.
The project is successful, she said, because “it hits
the governance aspect. We’re working with rural people
who politically could be extremely strong when it comes to
their local governance and the use of their resources.
“It also touches upon biodiversity and conservation.
People won’t conserve or sustainably use natural resources
unless they can see the benefit of conservation. And, of course,
there’s the livelihoods aspect. There, people may have
absolutely no other source of income or very few other alternative
sources of income. So this is a very tangible poverty alleviation
program.”
Notes from Natsios
 |
|
Andrew Natsios
|
Fragile States: From Vision to Action
Fragile states pose a difficult development challenge. They
are either in crisis or vulnerable to crisis. Many are beset
by conflict and insecurity, governance and economic crisis,
or famine. There are no quick fixes to strengthen governance
or build a country’s ability to improve the lives of
its citizens.
But we have learned a great deal from working in these settings
over the past two decades. From these lessons, USAID is developing
a Fragile States Business Model. This model will set a course
for working in fragile states to ensure a rapid and flexible
response.
One of the central lessons is the need for such an approach,
so that USAID can respond quickly to opportunities and challenges
on the ground. The model will touch on all core functions
of the Agency, including monitoring, planning, budget, program,
personnel, and procurement.
I hope that it will translate the vision of our Fragile
States Strategy into long-term action.
Accurate and timely information is key to an effective response
to state fragility. USAID is developing an alert and tracking
system managed in the Bureau for Democracy, Conflict, and
Humanitarian Assistance (DCHA), which will identify crises
and feed into the State Department’s Office of the Coordinator
for Reconstruction and Stabilization. DCHA is also developing
and pilot testing a tool for country-level analysis of fragility.
Streamlined strategic planning processes are vital to this
business model. For severe crisis countries, operational plans
of 12–18 months will be allowed instead of the standard
three-year plan.
Budgetary flexibility is another important tool. When a
country is identified as needing assistance to remedy fragility,
regional bureaus and missions will assess whether current
programs and resources are well suited to respond.
We need to improve how we identify our objectives and measures
of success in fragile states. In many cases, USAID-supported
programs cannot accomplish the same goals in fragile states
as in more stable settings.
Procurement and implementation instruments also must become
more flexible when dealing with fragile states.
We are considering a variety of steps to more effectively
respond to crisis situations, including the development of
scenarios and scopes of work to provide quickly on-the-ground
resources and various implementing options—similar in
some respects to what the Office of U.S. Foreign Disaster
Assistance uses with humanitarian aid to provide immediate
personnel and technical services.
The Office of Acquisition and Assistance has already begun
training a cadre of specialists in the special authorities
frequently used in crises situations in order for them to
be readily called upon to implement and modify instruments
as needed.
The ultimate resource of effective development assistance
is the skilled, professional personnel of USAID and our partners.
Our fragile states business model will establish new ways
to deploy personnel support for missions in fragile states.
We are hiring new foreign service officers to deal with crisis,
stabilization, and governance. And we are expanding how we
draw on the talents, insights, and skills of our talented
foreign service national staff.
Finally, the business model calls for strong collaboration
with the State Department and the military. USAID is also
leading an effort at the Organization of Economic Cooperation
and Development to examine lessons from service delivery in
fragile states, particularly postconflict settings.
Getting effective assistance to the citizens and institutions
of fragile states is an appropriate challenge for USAID. Our
ultimate success will depend upon each one of our talented
staff working with local partners and adapting the model so
we can better address fragility and advance transformational
development worldwide.
Back to Top ^
|
