21 November 2023
By: Lebogang Mashala
Farmers and conservationists are working together in the greater Kruger National Park (KNP) region to restore and maintain the Sabie River, part of the region’s strategic water source area (SWSA).
The Kruger park is an important source of employment and local economic development and the centre of the “Kruger economy”, which includes wildlife and the livelihoods of communities.
According to WWF South Africa, the entire system of survival for humans and wildlife depends on the Mpumalanga-Drakensberg SWSA. This includes the Sabie River, which flows from the mountain catchment through forestry plantations, farmland and numerous communities into the park and out to Mozambique.
Conservation ecologist Samir Randera-Rees, the manager of WWF-SA’s water source areas programme, says SWSAs are arguably the country’s most important natural and economic assets. Randera-Rees also notes that 10% of South Africa’s land area, mostly in high mountain catchments along the eastern escarpment, generates 50% of the water in all river systems.
In 2019, one of the freshwater projects of the WWF Nedbank Green Trust focused on the Mpumalanga-Drakensberg SWSA. The project was carried out in partnership with the Kruger to Canyons Biosphere (K2C), which covers 2.5 million hectares. The land includes protected areas, catchments, and privately and community-owned land in Limpopo and Mpumalanga.
According to Tobie Badenhorst, head of group sponsorships and cause marketing at Nedbank, the project requires complex management of the entire river system and involves many stakeholders and communities. “Several partners are working together to enhance the quality and quantity of water throughout the system while promoting job opportunities and livelihoods in the region,” he said.
The integrated management and sustainability of the Kruger economy depends on all forms of conservation, including water and wildlife, said Badenhorst, and WWF-SA, K2C and KNP partners are working with the Global Environment Facility (GEF) to focus on livelihood projects.
“These projects include community environmental monitors who patrol KNP’s boundary fence every day, reducing poaching and illegal wildlife trade,” he said. The monitors help to prevent community cattle from entering the park through broken or cut fences, leading to impounding. By stopping wildlife leaving the park, they minimise human-wildlife conflict such as elephants destroying crops and predators attacking cattle.
The monitors’ salaries are paid by the government’s Expanded Public Works Programme. “Most of the environmental monitors have matric and they participate in field guide and ranger training to enhance their career paths,” said Lazaro Sibiya, GEF stewardship supervisor in the KNP.
As part of their training, individuals working with WWF-SA learn about the legal requirements of their work, including protection of human rights, use of minimum force, and the proper way to obtain statements.
Lara Rall, the project implementation and communications manager at WWF-SA, said the organisation collaborates with the local judiciary to increase the number of successful prosecutions for poaching and illegal trade in rhino horn and other wildlife products.
Dimakatso Nonyane, a former environmental monitor, works with Marie-Tinka Uys, the chief operating officer of K2C, on the Resilient Waters programme.
“The programme aims to employ community members in removing alien invasive vegetation, promoting sustainable cattle grazing, and sustainable water usage for farming and forestry,” Nonyane said. These efforts are designed to improve the quality and quantity of water downstream in the Sabie River.
One of the major problems the programme addresses is pollutants in the river, such as fertilisers, sewage and illegally dumped nappies and sanitary pads. Nonyane said the team is speaking to local communities to find sustainable solutions, such as building kilns to burn the nappies and sanitary pads and adding the ash to cement to create bricks.
Freshwater scientists from the University of the Western Cape tested the water and found it unfit for human consumption. “You cannot have humans, livestock or wildlife drinking polluted water,” said Nonyane, adding that lack of municipal services is a problem and many people in communities bordering the Kruger have to buy water.
Access to water is deemed a fundamental human right by the UN, and the National Water Act takes this a step further by recognising not only humans but also rivers as entities with a right to water. This means a certain amount of water, known as the ecological reserve, must be left in rivers to ensure their vitality and functionality. Proper management of this reserve is crucial for effective freshwater and catchment management.
Conservation efforts must begin at the top of the upper Sabie catchment and tackle issues such as reduced flow due to extensive water use by agroforestry, invasive alien plants and commercial farming. These competing demands can significantly decrease the amount of water available to lower catchment farmers, the KNP ecosystem and the cross-border flow into Mozambique.
“In every project we undertake, we engage the community to co-create solutions and participate. We also present agroecology and water conservation programmes at the local schools,” said Uys.
There are good examples of agroecological farming in the region, such as Siphiwe Sithole’s farm near Malelane, where she mainly cultivates African indigenous crops for the slow food market.
Malelane has a bank called Akwandze (“expand” in SiSwati) which offers loans to the approximately 1 400 sugar cane farmers in the region, including those without equity.
Mfundo Msimango started farming with sugar cane in 2021 and has since leased 150 ha. He has done well for himself but says farming sugar cane is very hands-on. He has added another 48 ha and started growing cotton and paprika as part of a project with Woolworths. Paprika is in high demand, achieves a good yield at 2,5-2,8 tons/ha and fetches R27-R30/kg.
Evans Mashego, an agricultural economist for the Malelane and Komatipoort region, says the market for sugar cane is good, no matter how much is produced. Farmers gross about R88 000/ha.
Sugar cane is a thirsty crop and must be managed carefully. Drip irrigation is the preferred irrigation system to conserve water.
“Water conservation is imperative to protect our country’s water supply, and it is the business of every South African to support this,” said Randera-Rees. “How we manage our water at every level is not something that can be put off. It is the responsibility of all of us.”
