Controversy over lodge proposals in Mana pools
http://www.thezimbabwean.co.uk/
Written by Wild Zambezi News
Sunday, 14 November 2010 13:59
The cash-strapped Zimbabwe Parks and Wildlife Management Authority has asked
stakeholders to ratify four new 24-bed lodge developments for Mana Pools,
three of these along the eco-sensitive river frontage and one inland. This
comes less than a year after international outrage at Protea Hotels seeking
to develop a 72-bed conference facility on the banks of the Zambezi River
right opposite Mana Pools National Park and World Heritage Site.
Conservationists and lovers of Mana Pools as a wilderness Park are up in
arms at the proposals – for several reasons.
A recently-completed Park Management Plan, carefully negotiated and agreed
between the Zimbabwe Parks Authority and relevant stakeholders, specifically
advised against any new Park developments along the Zambezi river shoreline
in Mana Pools because of the small size and very ecologically-sensitive
nature of the Zambezi alluvial terraces known as “the Mana floodplain”. It
did, however, allow for small developments at selected sites inland.
The Management Plan acknowledges that Mana Pools is important for the unique
low-volume, high wilderness tourism experience it offers visitors, and
advises that these values should be maintained into the future.
Critics of the proposed developments believe that increasing tourism
bed-nights along the Zambezi river frontage by an effective 72 people per
night would bring associated impacts which would seriously erode the very
values that the industry sends its clients to enjoy.
New developments in the already impacted “floodplain” area would, they
believe, “kill the goose that lays the golden egg”.
The Management Plan remains unsigned by the relevant Ministry, despite
having been completed 18 months ago, a fact which has called into question
Zimbabwe’s true commitment to proper and accountable planning procedures for
National Parks and globally significant areas like UNESCO World Heritage
Sites.
It is well known that the Zimbabwe Parks and Wildlife Authority is short of
money to manage its estate. The recent proposals have drawn criticism that
the authority is seeking short-term quick-fix solutions to its financial
crisis at the expense of the long-term future and sustainability of the
country’s magnificent wild areas.
Zimbabweans are being made to look foolish in objecting to Zambian
developments opposite Mana Pools on the grounds of unacceptable tourism
impacts while effectively increasing tourism impacts on their own side of
the Zambezi River.