Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Figures and tables
- Abbreviations and glossary
- Foreword
- Preface and acknowledgements
- 1 The place, methodology, and chapter overviews
- 2 Brief history of the central Luangwa Valley
- 3 Munyamadzi Game Management Area and its residents
- 4 The changing nature of rural community lives
- 5 Human welfare and resource status at Nabwalya Central, 1966–2006
- 6 Community Resources Board and community participation
- 7 Perspectives from the Munyamadzi Game Management Area communities
- 8 A conclusion to the 2006 exercise
- 9 A perspective covering eight decades
- 10 Conjuring the Munyamadzi Game Management Area as a frontier
- Appendix A Revised questionnaire, 2006
- Appendix B Major characteristics of village area groups within the Munyamadzi Game Management Area communities, 2006 and 2011
- Appendix C Respondents’ comments on ‘fairness’ of Zambia's wildlife exchange
- Notes
- References
- Index
7 - Perspectives from the Munyamadzi Game Management Area communities
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 19 March 2020
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Figures and tables
- Abbreviations and glossary
- Foreword
- Preface and acknowledgements
- 1 The place, methodology, and chapter overviews
- 2 Brief history of the central Luangwa Valley
- 3 Munyamadzi Game Management Area and its residents
- 4 The changing nature of rural community lives
- 5 Human welfare and resource status at Nabwalya Central, 1966–2006
- 6 Community Resources Board and community participation
- 7 Perspectives from the Munyamadzi Game Management Area communities
- 8 A conclusion to the 2006 exercise
- 9 A perspective covering eight decades
- 10 Conjuring the Munyamadzi Game Management Area as a frontier
- Appendix A Revised questionnaire, 2006
- Appendix B Major characteristics of village area groups within the Munyamadzi Game Management Area communities, 2006 and 2011
- Appendix C Respondents’ comments on ‘fairness’ of Zambia's wildlife exchange
- Notes
- References
- Index
Summary
Funds are not available for road construction or it is underfunded. I wonder about this negligence because this area greatly contributes to the national income each year. Presently, there is nothing enjoyable or good about our current living, because wildlife is a menace to both our lives and to our crops. I cannot say anything, for whatever I say will not be considered; yet if villagers could be assisted in chasing away wildlife, it would be somewhat better. [80-year-old man, Chilima]
Introduction
People living in fragile, drought-prone rural areas struggle with extensive risks, possess few possessions, and have slim chances for earning a living from other means than using those materials around them. Respondents in these locales can speak about themselves, about their predicaments, and about their hopes, fears and visions better than any desk-bound bureaucrat or itinerant. To elicit local responses demands knowing when and how to ask as well as assiduous listening. In this section, we discuss what the Mipashi team learned about full-time and casual employment, about arrests for extra-legal uses of wildlife and its consequences, and about the sources for most ‘poaching’. Given these costs and experiences, the team asked residents if they considered the current wildlife programme a ‘fair exchange’ and about their personal and communal visions for their homeland. In addition, some residents shared their ideas about why their land had not developed as they had hoped or were promised.
Most villagers knew that the local economy and their welfare depended progressively upon access to cash and upon those generating or possessing it. The intermittent droughts and floods of recent years were harsh, particularly for those dependent exclusively upon hoe agriculture and local natural products. Consequently, employment and cash generation seemed to be on everyone's mind in 2006. Men sought money for access to material goods and to attract clients, including wives, relatives, and children – in some ways a narrower continuation of the values and investments of an earlier ‘wealth in people’ system. The ‘wealth in people’ label distinguishes a social system in which material wealth (cash, goods, and employment) is used mainly to enlarge one’s number of supporters or clients whose assistance can be commandeered if needed later, rather than for the exclusive production of additional capital or for display.
- Type
- Chapter
- Information
- Discordant Village VoicesA Zambian 'Community Based' Wildlife Programme, pp. 145 - 179Publisher: University of South AfricaPrint publication year: 2014