Environmental Engineering Reference
In-Depth Information
of revenue they retained and increase the amount going directly to sub-district
levels. By 1996 the proportion of income going to communities for use at their
own discretion was 62 per cent, with an additional 5 per cent reaching communi-
ties but being managed by the RDC. By the year 2001, community benefits fell to
only 38 per cent, although there are exceptions such as Binga, which allows
communities to receive between 70 and 80 per cent of the wildlife income. The
reluctance of RDCs to devolve income generation to lower-level institutions
severely reduced the amount of income reaching households.
A review of the Gairezi Resettlement Area in the Eastern Highlands of
Zimbabwe in 2006 conducted by Taylor and Murphree (2007) considered the
impacts of fly fishing on the Gairezi river. The Gairezi Community Eco-tourism
Project seeks to alleviate poverty and improve rural livelihoods amongst house-
holds living in the Gairezi Resettlement Area, which was established after 1980.
The CAMPFIRE Association provided a series of grants from USAID until
2003, while the community contributed locally available materials, such as stone
for building and the provision of labour to construct infrastructure.
The project employs seven full-time staff and a number of occasional staff,
and certain households have benefited financially. A small local market for vegeta-
bles and other produce is also provided for the Project's visitors. Overall financial
returns to the community have been modest by comparison with wildlife income
from sport hunting in other areas. Before the Trust came into existence a club of
200 sport anglers, the Nyanga Downs Fly Fishing Club (NDFFC) had made
annual cash payments to the community in the range of Z$4000-5000 per
annum, or about Z$20/25 per member. In 2004 the payment was raised to
Z$10,000,000, which at that time was a substantial improvement (see Table 7.7).
In 2005 an innovation in payments was introduced by the Trust. Offered a cash
payment by the NDFFC, the Trust suggested that members would prefer to
receive payment in fertilizer, something that was difficult for Gairezians to obtain
and transport. The NDFFC agreed, and as a result 200 50kg bags of fertilizer
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were purchased and delivered for distribution.This highly ostensible and practical
mode of revenue distribution clearly made a great impact (Taylor and Murphree,
2007).
Taylor and Murphree (2007) state that it would be misleading to suggest that
the project could make a vast impact on household incomes or livelihoods, nor to
our knowledge has this ever been claimed at either community or district levels.
However,Taylor and Murphree (2007) conclude that the project has indeed made
a favourable contribution to livelihood improvement in Gairezi through its fertil-
izer pay-outs at a time of national shortages. Moreover, an average annual return
of US$14.8 per household over the past three years compares more than
favourably with the equivalent national statistic for CAMPFIRE of US$4.6 per
household (Bond, 2001). In the long run, it is also contributing on a more subjec-
tive level, for example, by stimulating people to think of other ways in which their
environment can be used sustainably. Within an area with few economic alterna-
tives, Taylor and Murphree (2007) suggest ecotourism generally, and fly fishing
specifically, can be an extremely competitive land use option.
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