By H. GAREKAE, O.T. THAKADU and J. LEPETU
Understanding
conservation attitudes of local communities is essential to the
long-term sustainable management of natural resources such as forests.
This paper, guided by the Social exchange theory, examined attitudes of
local communities towards management of Chobe Forest Reserve (CFR) and
explored factors influencing conservation attitudes in the study area. A
survey instrument was administered to 183 households, randomly sampled
across three communities adjacent to CFR. Additionally, in-depth
interviews with selected key informants were conducted. Both descriptive
and inferential statistics were used for analysing data. The study
findings revealed that communities generally held positive attitudes
towards forest conservation. Place of residence, age, length of
residency and forest dependency were observed to be significantly
influencing attitudes towards forest conservation. For sustainable
forest management and conservation to be achieved, it is vital that
community's needs and aspirations, their attitudes and perceptions
regarding conservation are considered and factored into strategies and
management planning.
No comments:
Post a Comment