Zimbabwe Secretariat for Transfrontier Park

Date: 16 August 2004

Source: New Era (Windhoek)

Author: Anon

Harare

Zimbabwe has been appointed secretariat for the Zambezi-Okavango Trans-frontier Park which encompasses Angola, Botswana, Namibia and Zambia, Environment and Tourism Minister Francis Nhema said.

The appointment was made at a meeting of minis-ters responsible for environment and tourism from the five countries held in Livingstone, Zambia recently.

"We held the meeting to update ourselves on projects in the Transfrontier Park. We are also looking at the promotion of the Zambezi-Okavango River Basin, which is known as the Zambezi-Okavango Trans-frontier Conservation Area," Nhema said.

"We plan to take advantage of the Zambezi and Okavango River and the spectacular Victoria Falls and jointly market the area for sustainable use. We agreed to have a full secretariat to run with the pro-gramme and Zimbabwe was appointed to that position."

The minister said each country was tasked to ensure certain standards of tourist facilities were maintained and that improvements were environmentally friendly to maintain the area as a conservancy.

The ministers discussed marketing, visa regimes, access to areas through neighbouring countries, prohibitive fees and licences and improvement of facilities like airports and accommodation.

The Livingstone meeting was a follow-up to one held in Namibia's Katima Mulilo last year. Nhema said the ministers were scheduled to meet again in November, in Botswana, to check on progress.

"We need to secure and improve management of our natural resource base. I believe we will collaborate in management planning towards harmonised land use, including joint inventory of resources, monitoring and research and in actively supporting sustain-able tourism development," he said. - New Ziana