Meaningful partnership creates win-win situation
DAVE SAVIDES writes about the benefits of the KZN Wildlife and RBM agreement
THE announcement last week of the signing of an agreement between Richards Bay Minerals and Ezemvelo KZN Wildlife is significant not only for the two parties, but for a far wider range of stakeholders.
RBM Managing Director, Mpho Mothoa and Ezemvelo CEO, Bandile Mkhize put pen to paper testifying to a memorandum of understanding that will bring benefits to both the mining giant and the conservation watchdog body.
The theme of the agreement was that the two businesses are not mutually exclusive but – given the right will and spirit of compromise – can be carried out in harmony.
At the centre of the arrangement is the fact that both mining and conservation cannot succeed without local communities being considered as central stakeholders.
Mkhize has long warned that any attempts to save and protect animals in the wild will be meaningless if the people living alongside game reserves and without jobs and food.
Similarly, unless these neighbours derive some kind of benefit from tourism, they will have no incentive to be ‘tourist-friendly’.
His new thinking has already shown tangible benefits as youth, especially, in adjacent rural areas have been seconded as ‘ambassadors’ in game reserves – and they are as enthusiastic and protective of the environment as are the Ezemvelo rangers themselves.
Mining entities have also reshaped their thinking and have seen the need for good relationships between themselves and the local communities in which they mine and from which they derive much of their work force.
RBM has gone further than most in allotting a fair number of shares to community groups, making them true stakeholders and diminishing the ‘us and them’ barrier.
The money generated by mining is, of course, not insignificant, and when some of that profit is ploughed back into the communities, either directly or through ventures such as the new ‘RBM Corner’ at Hluhluwe’s Hilltop camp, it’s a win-win for all.
One trusts that in future when discussions begin on proposed new mining ventures – even before the EIA process begins – all the stakeholders will sit together in this fashion and engage, civilly and open-mindedly, on a relationship basis, before calling their respective forces to war.
