The Swaziland National Biodiversity Strategy and Action Plan, 1999

This is the draft Swaziland National Biodiversity Strategy and Action Plan and as such is a working document and not a formal policy document. It should not be interpreted as the policy of the Government of Swaziland until it has been finally agreed and adopted.

5.0 Implementation of BSAP

Strategies and action plans are relatively easy to write up. Without their implementation, however, these plans are of little value. The Swaziland Environment Action Plan (1997) recognised the fact that, in African countries, implementation of strategies have often fallen behind the target. The main reasons given for this were: unusually high targets; lack of cooperation between institutions; lack of participation by local resource users; lack of political will and/or political instability; inadequate financing; lack of regional and international collaboration and support.

Three actions were identified by SEAP that would improve the implementation of SEAP objectives:

The development of partnerships between the various implementing institutions (including the private sector, and community/local and regional administrations).
The use of policy instruments including economic policy instruments and non-fiscal policy instruments such as Environmental Impact Assessments (EIA).
The monitoring of SEAP policies and strategies in order to provide feedback on progress with respect to objectives.

For further details on this subject see the SEAP document.

5.1 Funding

Appropriate funding will be crucial to the implementation of BSAP. The SEAP document identified three potential sources of funding which are summarised below.

External sources

Funding from foreign donors needs to be explored. The Global Environment Authority (GEF), which funded the development of this BSAP document, funds biodiversity projects of global significance. Since the biodiversity of Swaziland does have global significance, funding from the GEF is a possibility.

Other external sources could include bilateral grants from "developed" countries or loans from the World Bank (WB).

National sources

Various potential sources of funding exist from National sources including the Government of Swaziland (GOS), the private sector and the NGO community. Indeed, funding from the GOS is essential as this would indicate commitment on the part of the government.

National Environment Fund

A National Environment Fund (NEF) for Swaziland has been planned and is envisaged to become operational in due course. The purpose of this fund would be to support environmental protection initiatives in the country. The donor community has indicated its willingness to support this fund on the basis that the GOS makes the initial contribution. Most BSAP initiatives would almost certainly be eligible for funding from the NEF. For more information on the NEF see the SEAP document.

5.2 Relationship with SEAP

The Biodiversity Strategy and Action Plan does not stand alone, but is an integral part of the SEAP process. SEAP identifies five major programme areas one of which is the "Management and use of biodiversity". The primary goal of this programme area is to formulate and implement a National Biodiversity Strategy and Action Plan. Thus the BSAP process is rooted in the SEAP process and cannot be viewed in isolation.

5.3 Role of the Biodiversity Steering Committee

A Biodiversity Programme Implementation Committee has already been selected to initiate the SEAP "management and use of biodiversity)" programme area. The main objective of this committee will be to oversee the implementation of BSAP. As most members of this committee would have been involved with the formulation of BSAP, there will be continuity in the process (without which history and experience are lost).

As the implementation of BSAP will require a large amount of administrative work, it is suggested that the SEA recruit a BSAP Implementation Officer (or Biodiversity Officer) responsible to the Director.

5.4 Involvement in regional initiatives

There are currently two major regional (cross-border) initiatives which concern Swaziland, namely: the Maputo Development Corridor, and the Lubombo Spatial Development Initiative. Both these initiatives include the involvement of the Governments of Mozambique, South Africa and Swaziland, and are being planned as an agro-tourism investment zone. The development strategy is designed to promote coordinated private and state sector investment in focused areas of these three countries that can become an integrated zone for vibrant new industries, especially in the fields of ecotourism and agriculture. These two initiatives provide an exceptional opportunity for the implementation of BSAP, which should not be squandered. Furthermore, as these two initiatives combined cover a large (and topographically diverse) area of the country, implementation of projects within these areas should have a significant impact on biodiversity conservation in Swaziland as a whole.

5.5 Convention to Combat Desertification

The Convention to Combat Desertification (CCD) at this stage is probably the most important convention affecting the implementation of BSAP. Many of the goals and identified projects of the CCD support the conservation of biodiversity in general, and the implementation of BSAP, specifically.

Desertification is defined as the degradation of land especially in arid, semi-arid or dry sub-humid climatic regions as a result of human and climatic processes. Currently, it is estimated that more than half of all communal grazing land in Swaziland is seriously or very seriously eroded. In response to this threat Swaziland has engaged in a number of programmes and projects to combat desertification, details of which may be found in Downing & Zuke (1996) and Fakudze & Mlipha (1998). Most of these projects revolve around improving the status of grazing lands and since the degradation of the landscape has been identified as a major threat to Swaziland’s biodiversity, these projects will also assist the process of biodiversity conservation. Also considering the poor state of the economy and associated dearth of funds, closer cooperation between BSAP and CCD will be imperative to successful implementation of both processes.

This page was last updated on 11 October 2005