Professor Moenieba Isaacs
On 25 June 2025, the Institute for Poverty, Land and Agrarian Studies (PLAAS) at the University of the Western Cape attended a public meeting on iSimangaliso Wetland Park’s (IWP) expansion programme with Maputo National Park – a new transfrontier park between South Africa and Mozambique to be declared a United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO). This fits part of the Kunming-Montreal Global Biodiversity Framework (GBF) targets of 30X30: “Ensure and enable that by 2030 at least 30 per cent of terrestrial and inland water areas, and of marine and coastal areas are effectively conserved and managed…”. Both countries are signatories to expand their protected areas.
The meeting was part of community and stakeholder participation and Peace Parks Foundation funded the process through the Department of Forestry, Fisheries and the Environment (DFFE) in St Lucia at the Ecovillage Lodge. Although a DFFE process, they were not present to make the presentation and it was done by a local consultant, who is a former iSimangaliso staff member. Key messages from this meeting were protection, boundaries, and communities. However, the representatives of the communities arrived late, after the presentation, as they had transport issues due to the location and it not being close to public transport routes.
A short background on the UNESCO status of the IWP
IWP was declared in 1999 by the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) as a community empowerment and tourism park mainly for its rich natural and biodiversity heritage, and a superlative natural phenomena for it beauty, species, and the merging of three ecosystems – coastal forests, ocean, and wetlands. So it makes conservation sense to expand this status to the Maputo National Park, already supported by IUCN. It needs the South African government via DFFE to support their application. In addition, to the expansion will also include Other Effective Area-based Conservation Measures (OECMs), which are areas outside of formally protected areas that contribute to the long-term conservation of biodiversity through effective in-situ management. The proposed Maputo-IWP transfrontier parks calls it buffer zones – delineated areas part of the conditionality for UNESCO status. These are the areas where communities reside, and our work in the area since 2021 shows the daily struggles communities face when entering the park for fishing, food, medicine, hunting, and other livelihood activities. – Mbhele et al 2025.
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This initiative is mainly driven from the Mozambican side with the support of the IUCN and their government approached South Africa for their support since IWP already has UNESCO Heritage status. There seems to be government support for this expansion as DFFE Minister Dion George declared his department’s support for this expansion of IWP. However, it offered no funding for public participation, which was then delayed until the Peace Park Foundation came to the rescue – a little too late to garner public support. The IUCN made a strong proposal to UNESCO, and they also happen to be the World Heritage Committee’s official advisor on nature for the inclusion of Maputo National Park in the World Heritage status of South Africa’s IWP.
The final decision will take place between 6 and 16 July 2025 at 47th session of the UNESCO committee in Paris, days before the stakeholder consultation on the expansion in South Africa closes on 20 July 2025.
Neither country has representatives on the committee deciding on the UNESCO World Heritage status, and they need to lobby countries who have a seat to vote on this proposal. The Department of International Affairs is involved in the regional and international negotiations, so too is DFFE, and strong diplomacy and lobbying is needed at the international level to get the UNESCO Transfrontier Park approved. South Africa has many successful transfrontier parks, such as the Kruger National Park, Kgalagadi Transfrontier park, and the Maloti-Drakensberg Transfrontier Conservation and Development Project, so some cross-learning has happened already.
At the St Lucia meeting, the opportunities for conservation were made clear as it aligned with the GBF framework of 30X30. When asked what this actually means, the answer was – “it is just that – 30×30?” A huge focus on getting tourists to stay in the area would be key to the success Tourism is promoted through the idea that “you can have breakfast in South Africa, lunch in Mozambique and dinner in Eswatini.” Community tourism has not worked or is not promoted and the tourists only come up to St Lucia, maybe Sodwana Bay, and then go back. They do not stay in the greater IWP area. The biodiversity economy as a key part of the expansion process was promoted in the meeting, and is also a focus for Minister George.
The meeting reinforced the often fractured relationship with communities, not only in applying their inputs to proposals but also how the expansion to protect nature trumps community empowerment even though it is their land that will be in the buffer zone, and their access and livelihoods activities will be restricted with further limits on their traditional practices. Land for conservation is a critical issue especially when referring to communities living in and surrounding protected areas. Land tenure systems differ in the two countries and although much of the land in northern KwaZulu-Natal is controlled by the Ingonyama Trust (customary communal land tenure) with concessions given to private conservation, the main ownership of land in South Africa is private, while in Mozambique the land is under State control. The differing land ownership structures could pose a challenge to the governance of the transfrontier park and the joint management committee overseeing it.
Some of the challenges mentioned in the meeting were on the sovereignty issues, mainly from the South African perspectives, They include the porous border and migration of people and its impact on South African health care systems, crime – especially vehicle theft – and domestic animal diseases such as foot and mouth disease.
Some of the questions posed:
- Who will fund this expansion?
- What is the role of private conservation as it is not indicated on your map, only public conservation?
- What will be the governance structure?
- Is this not just another form of land grab for animals that the communities will not benefit from?
- Why do you have this consultation here at the Eco Lodge so far from the communities of Khula?
- What is the role of the local municipality in the expansion of the area? Are they involved in this process?
