Local participation in transfrontier tourism: Case of Sengwe community in Great Limpopo Transfrontier Conservation Area, Zimbabwe

Abstract

Transfrontier cross-border nature conservation has become a fashionable target in many parts of the world, including southern Africa. Transfrontier conservation initiatives are considered to have great capacity for biodiversity conservation and sustainable tourism development by providing employment and revenue opportunities for poor people and communities. However, many previous studies have indicated that in spite of expectations and rhetoric there is often rather minimal community awareness and participation in conservation management, tourism economy and related opportunities. This study aims to discuss local people's perceptions of community participation, opportunities and constraints in sustainable transfrontier tourism in southeastern lowveld Zimbabwe. The results based on community interviews show that the people are aware of the potential role of tourism in improving livelihoods. The major challenge, however, is to address how this can be turned into concrete benefits for households and communities.

The Impact of the Rural Environment and Environmental Conservation on Poverty Alleviation: The Moderating Effect of Tourism Resources

“…Erdogan and Tosun (2009) and Han et al (2010) have mentioned that environmental conservation introduced in responsible tourism, rural tourism, sustainable tourism, and eco-tourism can encourage tourists to protect the environment. The finding is in line with past empirical studies such as Holden (2016), Chiutsi and Saarinen (2017) as well as Ounmany (2014).The mentioned studies recommend that the rural tourism, village tourism and farm tourism are the best practices in alleviating poverty. It is important to highlight that the Sarawak Forestry Corporation is enthusiastic in protecting the forests by preserving existing national parks such as Semenggoh Nature Reserve, Samajaya National Park, Kubah National Park, Santubong National Park, Gunung Gading National Park, Fairy Cave, Wind Cave, Niah Cave and Mulu National Park for environmental conservation.…”

“…Tourism practitioners in areas such as eco-tourism, sustainable tourism development, and responsible tourism are more aware of environmental conservation and poverty alleviation (Holden 2013). A case study in the Great Limpopo, Zimbabwe noted that the Sengwe communities are aware of the potential role of environmental conservation towards tourism which provides employment and revenue opportunities for the local people (Chiutsi & Saarinen 2017). Choosing tourism as a route to poverty alleviation helps in conserving the environment for the next generation (Holden 2016).…”

Study on Livelihood Assets-Based Spatial Differentiation of the Income of Natural Tourism Communities

“…Social assets affect not only community livelihoods but also community livelihood policies and systems [54], which is conducive to the optimization of spatial allocation of other resources [55]. In the development of community tourism, the lack of tourism knowledge and skills [56][57][58][59], the lack of information about tourism development [57], poor infrastructure [60], and the lack of power [22,25] are major factors that limit community residents' participation in tourism. Therefore, livelihood assets also have a strong influence on community residents' livelihood choice.…”

Local Communities’ Attitudes and Support Towards the Kgalagadi Transfrontier Park in Southwest Botswana

“…It is also important that factors that affect or influence residents' support for conservation of transboundary protected areas within their local communities are identified to benefit policy reviews and implementation [2,12,14,22,90,91]. Based on the identified factors in this study, similar studies could be replicated elsewhere including the KTP on the South African, and in other similar locations with transboundary conservation areas globally.…”