Ngoma: Empowering Villages Through Villages

The Chobe Enclave Consevation Trust is a prime example of Community Based Natural Resource Management (CBNRM) at work, and highlights the potential to successfully implement rural development through tourism in other areas of Botswana. Five villages within the Chobe Enclave - Mabele, Kavimba, Kachikau, Satau and Parakarungu came together in 1993 to establish the Trust, and are benefiting directly from tourism through it. The Chobe Enclave is a weave of land flanked on two sides by Chobe National Park and butting onto Botswana's Chobe River border with Namibia. The first in the country, the Chobe Enclave Conservation Trust was established to spearhead CBNRM in Botswana. Its incomes comes from joint initiatives with the private sector through tourism operations and the sale of hunting quotas. Revenues are shared in the form of development project assistance to the five villages. Profits are shared equally, but not in cash. Each village puts up project proposals and needs to the Board and is assisted accordingly. Each village is represented on the Trust Board and has a say in its management affairs. Within the Chobe Enclave is the exclusive Ngoma Safari Lodge, which is unique in being a high end property built with, and for, the local community a premier tourism destination . Built with the assistance from the United States African Development Foundation, the lodge was opened by President Ian Khama in July 2011. You can read more about this article on the latest Peolwane magazine in the library.