The World Bank/WBI’s CBNRM Initiative

Case Received: February 5, 1998

Author: Olivier Hamerlynck, IUCN Wetlands technical adviser

Telephone/Fax: +222 251276

Email: roma@pactec.org

In the Sahel, the margin between the Saharan desert and the area where rainfed agricultural can be practised annually, one finds a series of the poorest countries of the planet. In spite of a recent democratisation and decentralisation process, the region's institutional capacities for natural resources management remain weak. Two major rivers, the Niger and the Senegal, flowing north into much drier areas, are amongst the few natural assets of the area and have allowed the development of an economy based on nomadic pastoralism.

Until the early sixties the delta of the Senegal river was an area of extraordinary ecological richness. Consisting of a mosaic of dunes, floodplains and estuarine zones with mangroves, the area was known for its rich birdlife, important fisheries and dry season pasture. Several tens of thousand of people, practising a variety of activities (hunting, fishing, pastoralism, gathering of various natural resources such as water lily seeds for food, seedpods of certain types of trees for tanning, grasses for artisanal mats, etc.) found a livelihood there. Since then the environmental quality has deteriorated, first by the diminishing floods and rainfall that led to a food crisis in all of the Sahel, later by the alterations brought about by the large-scale hydraulic engineering works under the authority of the OMVS, Organisation pour la Mise en Valeur du Fleuve Senegal, a trilateral organisation grouping Mali, Senegal and Mauritania.

Under this scheme two major dams were built on the river in the eighties. Intended for irrigated agriculture, hydropower and river navigation the results for the valley as a whole have as yet been far below expectations. In the Mauritanian lower delta the flood control infrastructures have had disastrous consequences for the biodiversity and productivity, effectively creating a saline desert. Though mitigation mesures had been conveived and should have been in place prior to the dam closure they were never implemented. In the absence of the natural flood the floodplain forest and pastures died, groundwater recharge was eliminated and village wells became saline, hypersaline conditions in the former estuarine areas virtually wiped out the mangrove, etc. The local economy collapsed and massive rural-urban drift ensued.

In 1994, at the request of the Mauritanian government, IUCN, through a regional wetlands programme financed by DGIS - the Dutch Development Aid Agency, started a field project, within the framework of the creation of the Diawling National Park, to restore the ecosystem and to elaborate a management plan for the whole of the Mauritanian lower delta in collaboration with the stakeholders.

Originally a Wolof stronghold, Moors of Haratin descent, who used to come to the area with the herds during the dry season but have progressively sedentarised, are now the dominant ethnic group. The pre-dam delta had essentially a subsistence economy, except for the fishery products and dried grass sold at St. Louis. The ecological changes caused an important rural exodus. In 1994 the permanent inhabitants of the area were virtually exclusively women, children and old people. At that time it was estimated that there were less than 6,000 permanent residents, who's main income derived from the sale of mats made from the remaining (overexploited) Sporobolus stands.

After more than ten years of controversy the Diawling National Park was finally established in 1991. It covers about 16,000 ha of former floodplain. On the other bank of the river, in Senegal, the Djoudj National Park was in existence since 1971. A lot of the resentment against the creation of the Diawling Park was caused by the history of the Djoudj National Park, which included the forced removal of villages and repressive measures against grazing and fishing within its boundaries. From the outset the Diawling concept was different as can be seen from the objectives of the Park, as stated in the presidential decree of 1991:

• the conservation and sustainable use of the natural resources of a sample of the lower delta ecosystem;
• the permanent and harmonious development of the range of activities of the local population;
• the co-ordination of the pastoral and fishing activities within its boundaries.

The Park's objectives provided a clear mandate to integrate conservation and development and to include all stakeholder groups of the entire lower delta, not only those whose traditional rangelands are inside the protected area. To support this decidedly modern approach by the Mauritanian Government, IUCN and its local and foreign partners, started in 1994 by organising a visit by a multi-disciplinary team, composed of sociologists, hydrologists, agronomists, ichthyologists, protected area specialists, a botanist and an estuarine ecologist. In order to integrate the views of the local population a participatory approach was favoured. It was immediately clear that local knowledge of the former functioning of the system was highly developed and that it would be indispensable for the drafting of the management plan.

The main conclusions of the study were that it was necessary to restore the pre-dam flood cycle. The return of productivity would allow the local population to take up their traditional activities (in the central Bell basin of the Park and the peripheral zone) and to develop or extend new ones, notably ecotourism and market gardening. This should be accompanied by measures to facilitate transport (access roads, embankments) and to provide an adequate drinking water supply. Over 1994 and 1995 in-depth interviews were conducted with most of the stakeholder groups and additional scientific investigations were carried out. The first draft of the management plan was then circulated with the local partner institutions (Nouakchott University, Banc d'Arguin National Park, etc.). The second draft was presented to a wide audience of stakeholders and government institutions and, after amendments, approved by the Ministry of Rural Development and the Environment in early 1997.

In the meantime a first phase of ecosystem restoration, training and equipment of the Park authority and some small scale pilot projects with the local population were started. To restore the flooding, sluices and additional embankments were built. The implementation of the rest of the major objectives of the management plan (1997-2000): infrastructures for road access, water supply, market gardening, fishing and tourism, community development, boat building, handicrafts, environmental education, research, capacity building and biodiversity enhancement is being implemented by a partnership of IUCN, Dutch and French development aid.

All the villages in the lower delta are part of the commune of Ndiago, which has an elected mayor and a council. Initially these were extremely hostile to the Park and demanded that the decision to create a Park should be revoked. From the interminable discussions with the municipal council and various stakeholder groups it soon became clear that the `intellectuals' of the area, i.e. the teachers were among the fiercest opponents of the Park. Having lost contact with the ecosystem during their studies away from the delta they were convinced that the proposed management plan was a trick to keep the delta backwards. In their view the park, by also starving the population of drinking water was trying to force the people out so the birds would have the place to themselves. In contrast, most of the stakeholder groups that had to make a living from the natural productivity, could see the logic of what the Park was trying to do, even if they firmly believed that they would eventually be asked to leave `once the birds took over'.

After having explained the major axes of the management plan and having implemented some pilot projects of integrated rural development, a proposal was made to the commune to constitute a management committee which would assure the liaison between the Park and the local population for the joint management. It was proposed that this committee would have representatives from the most important stakeholder groups i.e. one for freshwater fishing, one for grazing, one for market gardening, etc. The commune's return proposal was a carbon copy of the municipal council, a body essentially composed of village chiefs. Some of the stakeholders felt they were not represented and some council members had very little knowledge of the functioning of the ecosystem. It has therefore not been a very useful structure for input to the management decisions. As a compromise the Park has been continuously providing the municipal council with the key technical documents and has made sure that members of the council were aware of, and could participate in, visits of local and foreign experts. The day to day contact and exchange of management advice is done on a village by village or stakeholder group and ad hoc basis. Finding an acceptable institutional arrangement to formalise these exchanges and to implement the management decisions that ensue will remain a difficult issue, especially as the extension of water management impacts to the Ntiallakh basin will considerably expand the stakeholder group number and diversity.

The first phase of the project concentrated on the three villages in closest contact with the Park and whose traditional rangelands were most affected by the new management. The approach was greatly helped by the fact that, at the Park's creation, some respected elders from various villages were recruited as `guards' and that the Park's head of surveillance is a respected local `cherif'. For surveillance clear instructions had been given not to take a repressive approach.

The procedure for stakeholder meetings was highly diverse and was left at the discretion of the village chief. In some villages Park staff would only get to meet the chief, in others a group of wise men would be gathered. Meetings with women's groups were often attended by two or three men, that normally stayed in the background.

For the villages whose rangelands have mostly disappeared into the Diama reservoir, the immediate development alternative was market gardening. The women organised themselves into co-operative groups with each member contributing 2 $ to the joint fund. The groups received some wire fencing, agricultural equipment and seeds. The needs of each group were assessed and the support could take different forms. Thus one village was provided with cement for a well, the women contributing for the iron and the professional diggers. For the initial six months technical advice was provided by a local `vulgarisateur agricole'. In the second season, when the women were on their own, except for some follow-up visits to check on bottlenecks, the area became a major exporter of vegetables to Nouakchott. The collective aspect quickly watered down as some women individually developed new gardens and started employing, mostly foreign, workers to water the gardens.

For the village of Zir Takhredient the main interest expressed was for fresh water fishing. Each fisherman traditionally `ownes' one or more stretches along the main creeks. If the owner is absent others may exploit the patch but have to give part of the catch to the owner's family. Normally the fishermen do not exploit the fish during their spawning migration but in exceptional circumstances such as a famine pre-spawners may be taken. In spite of all these sustainability measures, the lack of water brought fishing to an almost complete standstill. As the fishermen have an extremely detailed knowledge of pre-dam hydrology and fish migration and spawning patterns, technical collaboration was very productive. Two sluicegates were added to the original hydraulic scheme in order to allow for fish migration. With the hydraulic infrastructure completed in 1996 the water in the Bell basin could be completely controlled. The fishermen proposed an early flooding as they knew Tilapia wrasses are ready to spawn as early as July. The women insisted that the Sporobolus and other grasses needed rain before flooding to achieve optimal production. Waiting for the rain would delay flooding to August, which would considerably shorten the growth season of the fish. As a compromise the Park proposed to simulate rainfall by allowing only a thin layer of water to cover the crucial parts of the floodplain in July. The test was highly successful with women collecting grass stems of over 2.5 m. The regeneration of the Sporobolus grass allowed the artisanal production of mats made of grass and leather to resume. As there had been virtually no raw material available for over a decade most of the skills had been lost. Only very basic mats, bringing in 50$ a piece were still being made. A local consultant copied patterns from old mats in private collections and improved design and execution, thus increasing added value. The fishermen were provided with a fund for the purchase of fishing gear and they commercialised at least 15 tons of fish at 0.3 to 0.4 $ per kg.

Obviously, the return of productivity was a boon also for wildlife. During the African Waterfowl Census of January 1993 the Park, contained only 2000 waterbirds and a few cows in rainfed depressions, the 1994 count found only 2 birds in the Park, but in 1995 this shot up to nearly 50,000. Subsequent counts show a very clear relation between bird numbers and the maximum water levels reached during flooding. The Park now regularly contains numbers of international significance of pelican, cormorant, black stork, spoonbill, flamingo and lesser flamingo, shoveler, pintail, garganey and avocets and is listed as Mauritania's second Ramsar site. Many afrotropical species have also returned to the area to breed.

It may sound cynical but in a way the project has had the comparative advantage in 1994 of finding an almost completely destroyed ecosystem with very little exploitation pressure. Therefore, the gradual restoration of the hydrological cycle over the year 1994-1996 was immediately perceived by the local population as a positive action and the spectacular recovery of fisheries, pasture and Sporobolus led to a boom in local income. In the meantime the news has spread and the lower delta is attracting outside attention. Women come to the area from over 50 km away to collect Sporobolus, large herds have been sent in 1997 as there was little pasture elsewhere. Market-gardening, shrimp fisheries and tourism potential are attracting outside economic operators who may not have the same sustainability motivation. This entails risks of environmental degradation and conflict on land ownership and resource access. When the local population progressively moves into more intensive exploitation, i.e. the shrimp fishery, the gathering of Sporobolus and of Acacia nilotica seedpods or the development of market gardening, the Park managers have always a knowledge base and understanding of the ecosystem to fall back on in discussions on how to limit potentially negative impacts or over-exploitation. When the risks are explained, very quickly people in the assembly pick up the point and relate back to past events or bad seasons or make links between the different components of the ecosystem. Once the discussion amongst themselves starts it is relatively easy to kindle it with technical arguments and scientific explanations of what they themselves perceive as the way the ecosystem functions and how its productivity can be exploited and maintained at the same time. With short-term gain motivated investors from the cities this is quite another matter.

Major characteristics of the approach that seem to have had beneficial effects are:

• an open-minded and respectful listeners attitude towards traditional knowledge, concentrating on finding scientific explanations of the stakeholders' understanding of ecosystem functioning rather than disqualifying the sometimes strange contentions as folklore. An observant local always knows more than a visiting consultant.
• take development issues at least as serious as environmental issues; take a broad ecosystem-based approach and do not consider the protected area as a separate zone for most issues;
• total honesty about what can be achieved with the restoration, what not and what perhaps so that stakeholders know what to expect. Modesty in the claims can only turn out favourably;
• no false promises. If confronted with an expectation that cannot be fulfilled, answer that you will try to interest a partner in this particular aspect (and do so);
• enough time to identify key actors, win confidence, to prove ones assertions by field actions, to move slowly and carefully; mistakes are not corrected easily; creating a new national Park and a functioning joint management system takes at least one generation;
• select for communication skills in everyone dealing with the stakeholders. Get input from sociologists;
• build a constituency also at decision maker level and in the national scientific community; point out the avantgarde nature of the approach and that the country can be proud of this;
• continuous presence in the field to `feel' the signals of both the ecosystem and the stakeholders. Show high plasticity and follow an opportunistic strategy (with flexible funds) in response to the signals;
• wise use requires wise (wo-)men.