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The
Lekgophung Lodge is a community owned wildlife tourism lodge
located in the Madikwe Game Reserve in the north West Province
of South Africa.
The
key case study question is "How and how much can community-owned
lodge development within a protected wildlife area contribute
towards sustainably improving livelihoods of households in
communities bordering on the protected area?" The study
considers the following aspects: structural arrangements;
funding; financial returns and 'SMME' (small and medium enterprise)
linkages; employment opportunities; skills acquisition and
institution building; and lodge governance and development
coordination.
Direct
benefits from the Lekgophung Lodge enterprise are expected
to boost average household income in the village by about
R3, 150 per annum and overall disposable income by more than
26%. The rights and benefits to the Lekgophung community through
the lodge are durably secured through a range of mechanisms
including long term lease rights, partnership contracts with
private lodge operators who are required to pay a fixed fee
and a percentage of turnover to the community, participation
by the community in a multistakeholder park-based development
steering committee.
The
lodge is well integrated with park and local government development
initiatives. Although still in a construction phase, the lodge
has added value at many levels. The project brings substantial
economic benefits and works within the 'new' cost recovery
paradigm of protected area management.
However,
the lodge remains dependent on a capital subsidy and private
expertise mobilized via partnerships with the public and private
sectors. In taking up lodge governance functions, the Trust
and Lekgophung community could benefit from having tools and
processes to assess the impact of the lodge on local livelihoods,
and monitor asset and livelihoods trends.
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