African Wildlife & Environment Issue 82

WESSA LEADERSHIP FWF NE SLETT R 3 (2022)

Eastern Cape Grasslands National Park PROJECT BIOBLITZ

that allows those who live here to continue to benefit economically from their land. SANParks has been working on this project for several years with WWF South Africa and others.The intention is to establish partnerships with landowners to support the continued management and protection of the natural assets that are in their care. WWF uses a Ford Ranger for travel throughout the area. Landowners will retain the rights to their land and SANParks and its partners will work with them to help them protect the biodiversity on the land. This will be achieved on private and communal land on a voluntary basis through suitable contractual agreements, as well as the provision of benefits (such as tax breaks) to landowners. The landowners will still be able to generate income through conservation compatible activities. Following the February

Malachite Sunbird on red-hot pokers (Photograph: Angus Burns, WWF South Africa)

2022 bioblitz, many of the scientists were excited about the undescribed and unique species they were finding, and were eager to return for follow-up studies as the park project progresses. The birders saw huge potential for high-altitude avitourism here. Scientists also flagged issues that need to be addressed to enhance the condition of the veld and biodiversity in the area.The iNaturalist app, which is championed by the South African National Biodiversity Institute (SANBI), had already garnered information about some 1 382, species (predominantly plants) in the project area. Ongoing formal stakeholder consultations are currently underway as part of the push towards creating South Africa’s newest national park for the benefit of generations to come.

In February 2022, a group of scientists from some 20 organisations with specialist knowledge gathered in the little village of Rhodes. Their mission? To do a ‘bioblitz’ to record all living species in an area earmarked for the creation of a new grasslands national park around the famous Naudé’s Nek Pass (2 592m above sea level). Grasslands are under-protected in South Africa despite being vitally important for biodiversity, climate, water and agriculture. The grasslands of the Eastern Cape Drakensberg Strategic Water Source Area are one of 22 strategic water source areas around the country that encompass only 10% of the land surface area, but provide some 50% of our freshwater. This will not be a park where new fences will go up and people and their livestock will be removed but, a park within a working agricultural landscape

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