African Wildlife & Environment Issue 82

CONSERVATION

Namibia’s First GOSCARs Launched with Four Winners

The life’s work of Namibian community conservation pioneer Garth Owen-Smith was remembered and honoured in April when four conservancy field workers from the Zambezi and Kunene Regions received Namibia’s first annual GOSCARs – the Grass-Roots Owen-Smith Community Rangers Awards.

received a certificate and a cash prize to share with their conservancies. The total value of this year’s GOSCARs is N$100 000. The late Garth Owen-Smith initiated community based conservation in Kunene in the 1980s when this approach – empowering communities who live with wildlife to manage and benefit from it – was politically unacceptable. By independence, this way of doing conservation was showing irrefutably positive results, with poaching stopped and wildlife numbers increasing in Kunene, which led the new Namibian government to adopt community conservation as one of its driving philosophies. Conservation legislation was amended to give communal area dwellers the same conditional rights over wildlife that freehold farm owners had enjoyed since the 70s. Today Namibia has 86 communal conservancies, 43 communal forests, one community association for people who live inside the Bwabwata National Park, and 10 community fish reserves. By the end of 2020 community conservation had contributed an estimated N$ 10.753 billion to Namibia’s net national income. In 2019 (prior to COVID-19), conservancy residents earned a total cash income of N$85 097 978 and conservancies generated N$155 656 833 in returns, with more than 5 000 rural jobs facilitated. Community conservation covers 180 083 square kilometres – more than 20% of the country. Wildlife species have thrived in conservancies, although the 10-year drought in Kunene Region caused both domestic stock and wild animal numbers to seriously decline. Recent good rains bode well for recoveries. Dr Margie Jacobsohn, chair of the GOSCARs panel and Garth’s life and work partner said that the awards were set up to celebrate his 40-plus years of work in Namibia and draw attention to the men and women who work in the field, on the cutting edge of conservation.

Garth Owen-Smith (Photograph: John Ledger)

The award ceremony took place at Wêreldsend Environmental Centre on 7 April 2022, attended by more than 80 conservancy and community leaders, plus representatives of non-governmental organisations (NGOs), private sector and government. The winners are: Hans Haoseb, a rhino ranger in //Huab Conservancy, Thalubengwa James Nandu, field officer for Salambala Conservancy, Rodney Tjavara, Human-Lion Conflict Rapid Response Ranger in Puros Conservancy and Marthinus Sanib, rhino ranger for Torra Conservancy. They were recognized for their outstanding front-line work, contributing to the protection and better management of the valuable wildlife in their conservancies. The awardees

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