Projekt

The Sustainable Development Goals (SDG), adopted by all UN Member States in 2015 are a universal call to action to end poverty, protect the planet and improve lives by 2030. Yet, progress has been slow to date, and with only 10 years remaining there have been calls to mobilize for a decade of action. Community Based Natural Resource Management (CBNRM) programs aim to reduce poverty while improving conservation outcomes for biodiversity and natural resources and therefore can potentially achieve many SDG goals in one program. CBNRM programs have been implemented since the 1980's with increased uptake in the 90's since the Rio United Nations Conference on Environment and Development (UNCED) where the rights, values, knowledge, and management systems of indigenous peoples and local communities were recognized. However, there have been mixed results from these programs prompting continued debates between "social conservationists" supporting various forms of sustainable use with associated elements of poverty alleviation and social justice, and those proposing a "back-to-barriers" approach, reasserting "people-free" protected areas as the primary means of biodiversity conservation. Despite such ongoing debates, it appears there has been little innovation in the governance models underpinning CBNRM programs. The project intends to address this gap by drawing on new ideas in social innovation, systems thinking and organizational renewal. It aims to engage stakeholders and communities living in Namibian conservancies in a wildlife governance innovation process, seeking to improve conservancy governance and human-wildlife coexistence. In doing so it expects to contribute to knowledge production on processes of organizational innovation in CBNRM. Through this, a contribution to the development of new strategies for enhancing human-wildlife coexistence in a context of increasingly rapid global change is envisioned.

• Prof. Dr. Eva Schlecht

  Universität Göttingen
  Fakultät für Agrarwissenschaften
  Department für Nutztierwissenschaften
  Abteilung Tierhaltung in den Tropen und Subtropen
  Göttingen
  

• Dr. Ruth Kansky

  Stellenbosch University
  Faculty of AgriScience
  Conservation Ecology and Entomology
  Stellenbosch
  Südafrika
  

• Prof. Dr. Andreas Bürkert

  Universität Kassel
  FB 11: Ökologische Agrarwissenschaften
  Fachgebiet Ökologischer Pflanzenbau und Agraröko-
  systemforschung in den Tropen und Subtropen
  Witzenhausen
  

• Prof. Dr. Nikolaus Schareika

  Universität Göttingen
  Sozialwissenschaftliche Fakultät
  Institut für Ethnologie
  Göttingen