Policy lessons from the evolution of a community-based approach to wildlife management, Kunene Region, Namibia

A community-based natural resource management project in the arid Kunene Region of Namibia has evolved over time from a focus on halting poaching to ensuring community benefit from wildlife and ultimately to communities as proprietors of the wildlife resource. A Namibian NGO has used consistent and persistent ‘light-touch facilitation’ to assist communities to overcome problems in forming common property resource management institutions to manage the wildlife and conform with new government legislation. Pragmatic approaches to resolving conflicts over land and resources and to disputes between competing interest groups have enabled communities to make progress. Success has depended upon the intrinsic value communities place upon wildlife as much as instrumental incentives. Relations with the private sector have been governed by the degree of proprietorship enjoyed by communities.