Public–Private Partnerships in South African National Parks: The Rationale, Benefits and Lessons Learned - Responsible Tourism: Critical Issues for Conservation and Development - page 45

3
Public-Private Partnerships in South
African National Parks: The Rationale,
Benefits and Lessons Learned
Giju Varghese
Background and introduction
The conservation of nature and heritage provides benefits to societies and this is
recognized by all countries. Some of the benefits of nature conservation include
the slowing or even elimination of the threat of climate change; having good water
supplies and preserving species that can contribute to research for the prevention
and control of existing and future diseases. The conservation and preservation of
heritage promotes local cultures, creates employment and results in mutual
respect and exchange in a positive way. This can lead to the positive co-existence
of communities and regions (the peoples of the world) and can positively
contribute to global peace. Both nature and heritage conservation in South Africa
are government or non-governmental organization (NGO) led: they cannot be led
by the private sector as these are areas that do not provide returns on investments.
Therefore, certain companies may contribute a very small proportion of their
profit towards corporate social investment. Conservation is very expensive and its
planning needs to be very much long term: millions of years in the case of nature-
based projects. The benefits are often realized after the tenure of government
leaders and for this reason conservation may not get the focus it requires.
Therefore, conservation funding is frequently unavailable at the desired level.
The conservation of nature and heritage provides an opportunity for tourism,
which is already a large and growing industry that contributes significantly to
GDP in many countries. The developing world offers various biodiversity