SANParks Vision 2040 puts communities at heart of conservation

By Simon Nare

South Africa has set itself on a path of new discovery in conservation, a drive that seeks to draw deeply from indigenous knowledge while interrogating climate dynamics and the warnings science continues to sound about the dangers ahead.

That is the buzz captured in the South African National Parks Vision 2040 Indaba, which got underway in Gqeberha in the Eastern Cape on Wednesday, where the conservation body has brought together experts, traditional leaders, and communities under one roof to confront these complexities.

According to JP Louw, SANParks national spokesperson, the gathering and the adoption comes after a lengthy process in which the institution wanted to make sure of what the citizens and the communities had to say on the matter.

Many concessions have been made, and it is now anticipated that fragmented protected areas are becoming ecologically interconnected with living landscapes that include communal land and commercially