The exhibition held at Ikwenyana Creche on December 15th gave community members an opportunity to view 19 photographic panels and one community-drawn map detailing those natural resources valued by the community members of Mbolompo. The panels displayed the different resources and explained how the community manages these resources, as well as including direct quotations from interview participants.

The exhibition served as the final presentation of research completed by Daniel Petrie and Anna Goldman over 5 months while living in the study area. The panels, map and research report are available for download below.

All the panels and the map were given to representatives of the community committee, who will decide on how and where to keep these materials.

The exhibition was also attended by representatives of the Jabulani Foundation, Mdumbi backpacker community, as well as Prof Christo Fabricius, a specialist in Community Based Natural Resource Management (CBNRM) from the Nelson Mandela Metropolitan University.

This work addresses one of the major obstacles faced by communities, development agencies, government and environmental NGOs when trying to implement projects along the Wild Coast: a poor understanding of how local communities perceive and manage their natural resources.

We developed a research proposal to find out how the local community valued natural resources and what institutions were engaged to manage them. Contemporary writings in literature assert that natural resources are important as part of diverse livelihood strategies for South Africa's rural poor (Shackleton & Shackleton, 2007; Kepe, 2008; Leach, 1999). The non-material value of these resources, for instance how they contribute to things such as culture or identity, is however harder to measure (Kepe, 2008) and has been neglected by many of the studies in this field.

The community in which we are living is made up of Xhosa men women and children: workers, artisans, subsistence farmers, Christians, livestock herders, schoolgoers, absent migrant labourers, traders, government grant recipients, fishermen, soccer fanatics. They are people of the amaBomvana tribe, subjects of the traditional leaders – chief and headmen – to whom the government has entrusted this land.

What we had thought to be a peaceful farming land with beautiful beaches and warm hospitality is in fact a complex mess of disputes over land ownership and access to natural resources being contested by the local community, government, ecologists, eco-tourism operators, NGOs as well as foreign environmentalists backed by large aid financiers such as the World Bank, the EU and the United Nations.

It is difficult to understand who's interests should be prioritised. Is it the case that the local community is just one stakeholder, or is it the stakeholder? In a remote community where employment and education are minimal, where access to information is limited and transport expensive, it is feared that while the laws and permits are being signed and planning debates being held in offices in towns and cities elsewhere, the rural people who live here will be left unheard.

The aim of this research is thus to communicate how the local community views, uses and manages the natural resources of the area in such a way that they recognise it as their view – that they might use it to explain to outsiders (government, NGOs, ecologists and eco-tourism operators) how important these resources are to the people who live here.

We present a range of products, communicating at a range of levels in isiXhosa and English. The intention is that the presented research document is not limited in how it may be used, but that it could aid education, policy and planning, environmental conservation, lobbying government, or even that it might just be useful in offering outsiders a quick and broad view of how one community perceives their natural environment.

Available for download:
- Photographic panels and community-drawn map of natural resource value and management (coming soon)
- Full research report including findings, discussion and recommendations
- Extended preface to the research report
- Original research proposal
- Invitation to exhibition of research findings (December 15th)