Support conservation and socio-economic development in the Limpopo National Park

Between 2007 and 2015, AFD has supported the implementation of the management and development plan of the Limpopo National Park, one of the largest parks in Mozambique, emblematic of the local and cross-border challenges of supporting a regional protected area in Africa.

Context

The Limpopo National Park was established in 2001 by the Government of Mozambique on the territory of a former hunting concession covering an area of 11,230 km2. Together with Kruger National Park in South Africa and Gonarezhou National Park in Zimbabwe, it forms the Great Limpopo Transboundary Park (GLTP).

More than 20,000 people live in the park, mostly people who fled Mozambique during the civil war between 1977 and 1992, and returned to settle in the park. However, the area is marked by lack of infrastructure and economic opportunities and consequent high poverty rates among residents.

The Limpopo National Park Development Project, supported by the Peace Parks Foundation (PPF), is helping Mozambique respond to the challenges associated with the creation of this new national park.

Description

Between 2007 and 2015, AFD has supported the implementation of the management and development plan of the Limpopo National Park. This project is emblematic of AFD’s new approach to development in the early 2000s, which aims to link economic development with biodiversity conservation.

AFD’s support aims to achieve the three following objectives:

Restore and preserve biodiversity in the Limpopo National Park by supporting the implementation of the tourism, biodiversity protection, ecological research and monitoring, and environmental management programmes;
Improve the livelihoods and living standards of people living in the Limpopo National Park’s Support Zone by: supporting participatory planning and management of the Support Zone and; developing road infrastructures;
Build the Limpopo National Park’s administrative capacities by covering its running costs for the first two years of the project, strengthening staff capacities and improving donor coordination.

Impacts

Local economic development (park and its periphery), provincial and national through the development of infrastructures (roads in particular), job creation (tourism), development of irrigated agriculture;
Improvement of the living conditions of the residents of the Support Zone (education, health, limitation of human / wildlife conflicts) and better participation of the population in their own development;
Protection of biodiversity.

Download the project sheet

01/04/2007

Project start date

12/12/2016

Project end date

8 years

Duration of funding

Biodiversity

Sectors

Limpopo

Location

Grant