THE NATAL PARKS BOARD

A Conservation Adventure

George Hughes

SOUTH AFRICA was first settled in 1652 and over the next 250 years experienced a plethora of early explorers, adventurers, significant migrations of both Africans and Europeans and a surge of development, bringing with it the almost complete destruction, for reasons good and bad, normal and abnormal, of its incredibly large mammal populations as well as significant declines in its general biodiversity. Towards the end of the nineteenth century, these abundant and free natural resources that had made it possible for the region’s human populations to explore and to survive suffered from the tragedy of the commons and as a result almost ceased to exist, disappearing both as an economic resource and a source of wonder. The Colony of Natal had taken cognisance of the threats to and declines of important species. In Zululand the first protected areas were set aside in 1895, being followed by Giant’s Castle Game Reserve in 1903. In the Transvaal, Sabi Game Reserve was created in 1898. The restoration of South Africa’s wildlife resources had begun. From 1910 onwards, the country’s four provinces established conservation bodies and were joined in 1926 by the establishment of a National Parks Board, the form and structure of which was statutory, with a high degree of independence from normal state bureaucracy. Natal never offered any of its unique protected areas to the central government agency for declaration as national parks and, in 1944, a state delegation made a formal visit and tried to persuade the NPA to relinquish control of three historic and invaluable parks. Natal refused, but recognised the value of having a nature conservation authority a step removed from the standard state structures, where all staff would identify with the primary goal of conservation and its controlling board would have the flexibility to take decisions with conservation as the main objective. In 1947, Natal created its own statutory authority which went on, over the next fifty years, to develop internationally recognised strategies in the fields of conservation management and development. The Natal Parks Board thus contributed to South Africa’s reputation of restoring its almost extinct large mammal resources and enthusiastically promoted the development of what would become one of the greatest wildlife industries in the world. This is a story of the Natal Parks Board. Dr George Hughes has been involved in conservation for virtually all his working life. Developing an early interest in birds and reptiles, encouraged by sympathetic and empathetic school teachers at Estcourt High School and endowed with a great spirit of adventure and joy of the outdoor life he became a fair hunter and passionate trout angler, being drawn to the mountains and beauty of rural Natal. When he was 19 a friend persuaded him to join what turned out to be a two-year expedition to Europe from where, in 1960, he hitchhiked from northern Norway, through Yugoslavia and via Egypt and East Africa to take up his first formal conservation job as a learner ranger with the Natal Parks Board. After four years in Giant’s Castle Game Reserve, he went to the University of Natal and the Oceanographic Research Institute in Durban to emerge with a PhD in Zoology. Rejoining the Natal Parks Board in 1974 as a field biologist, he turned to management and be came its CEO in 1988. He retired in 2001

Book details

Download the entire book ( 5.7 Megabyte PDF file) free of charge here.

.