Tourism and Environment

The well-heeled mini state that is bucking the trend in Zimbabwe

Published

2 years ago

July 12, 2023

BY DOUGLAS ROGERS

One writer returns to the country of his birth to discover how a ‘Wonder of the World’ is transforming tourism in troubled times.

It was 4pm in Zambezi National Park, a few miles from the majestic Victoria Falls in Zimbabwe, and the watering hole was quiet. A fireball sun dipped over the borderlands to the west. From our timber-built hide, my son Whitaker, aged 12, panned his binoculars across the landscape and saw a cloud of dust on the horizon. “There’s something coming,” he said.

Steve Taylor, our Zimbabwe-born guide, took a look. “Good spot, Whitaker,” he said. “Buffalo. Hundreds of them!” He checked his watch. “They’ll be here in 45 minutes. Anyone fancy a sundowner?”

Sure enough, exactly 45 minutes later, 300 Cape buffalo stood drinking at the pan and, like a post-work stampede for happy hour, other animals began to appear – antelope, warthog, a dozen elephants, a lone giraffe. Somewhere nearby, hyenas howled.

“Ten years ago, you wouldn’t have seen game like this here,” said Taylor, founder and owner of Askari Safari, who splits his time between the United States and a new home in Victoria Falls. “The area was in trouble, and there were few animals because of poaching and mismanagement. Now, all that is changing.”

The reason is the establishment, in 2011, of the Kavango-Zambezi Transfrontier Conservation Area (Kaza), or Five Nations Peace Park. Kaza is the joining together of 36 national parks and three World Heritage Sites on the borders of five countries – Angola, Namibia, Botswana, Zambia and Zimbabwe – making it the largest transboundary wildlife system in the world. The size of France, and home to half of Africa’s elephants, Kaza has shown how cross-border cooperation on wildlife management, anti-poaching and community conservation can transform animal populations

Tourism is making a comeback, too, and Victoria Falls – Zimbabwe’s spray- drenched colonial river town, a Wonder of the World within Kaza – is booming. Helicopters buzz the cataracts, white-water rafters and luxury river boats ply the Zambezi and people like Taylor, who left Zimbabwe in the bad old days, are buying property there or moving back permanently.

This was my first post-Covid trip to the country of my birth, from my home in the United States. Part of the reason was to attend a memorial service for my late father in eastern Zimbabwe, where I grew up, but it was also a chance to spend a week’s holiday with my extended family in the Falls, on the opposite side of the country.

I love coming “home”, but Zim is a mess. Inflation is rampant, prices are exorbitant, roads and other infrastructure are crumbling. The exception is Victoria Falls, which might as well be another country. My first glimpse of it was at the impressive airport built by the Chinese in 2015. International flights arrive from seven countries and the energy and excitement at arrivals far exceeds what you feel when landing in Harare, the capital. “We have a saying here: ‘Turn left for Victoria Falls, turn right for Zimbabwe’,” said our transfer driver as he turned left out of the airport on to a smooth, newly built road towards the regenerated town.We had booked a thatched four-bedroom Airbnb named Acacia, in a leafy suburb, and that afternoon did what every self-respecting visitor to the Falls does: have high tea at the Victoria Falls Hotel. I confess, I was braced for disappointment. Built in 1904, the grandest of southern Africa’s grandes dames offers spectacular views of the steel railway bridge across the Zambezi Gorge, but my last visit there 15 years ago had been a complete disaster. With political turmoil and hyper-inflation at their height, there was no electricity, my room was full of cobwebs and I paid my bill with a backpack full of Zimbabwean dollars.

This time around, much to my surprise, the hotel was undergoing a multi-million-dollar renovation – and it looked immaculate. We were swiftly ushered to the Stanley Terrace, fronting lush green lawns where cucumber sandwiches, scones and a dozen types of cake were being delivered in style on three-tiered silver platters.

Far from rejecting its colonial past, the hotel honours it with an entire hallway of framed photographs of British Royalty. All around us, well-heeled Americans and Europeans were enjoying their afternoon teas and quaffing their pink gins.

But it isn’t just tourists who are coming back to this trend-bucking corner of Zim. An estimated five million Zimbabweans have fled the country since 2000, and most of them continue to live abroad. Of those returning, many choose to settle in the Falls. To get a glimpse of this local scene, Stephen Taylor suggested I visit Loretta’s Coffee Caravan, just around the corner from our Airbnb.Five years ago, the cafe’s owner “TK” Musungwa was running a driving school in Stockport, England, his family having fled Zimbabwe for Manchester in the early 2000s. On a visit to Harare, he met his now wife Loretta – a barista – and on a trip to the Falls, they discovered that they couldn’t find a decent cup of coffee anywhere. TK said farewell to England and Loretta’s Coffee Caravan was born, serving a chocolate-rich blend of Zimbabwean, Rwandan and Tanzanian beans as well as fruit smoothies.

“Vic Falls feels like an island far removed from the madness of Zim,” TK told me, “a small town where people can reinvent themselves. England is an easier place [to live], but this is the home I love.”

I certainly loved Loretta’s – a bustling coffee shop with tables set under a mahogany tree, frequented not by commuters seeking their caffeine fix but by khaki-clad game guides, armed park rangers, dashing river rafters and real-estate agents cashing in on the property boom.

On our third day, we hit the rapids. The Zambezi below the Falls arguably offers the greatest white-water rafting in the world, so I booked a trip with local outfit Shockwave.Its river outings are not for the faint-hearted. First comes an hour-long trek into the boiling belly of the gorge with the unsettling knowledge that an even steeper climb (up) awaits you down river. Tackling Grade 5 rapids with names such as Jaws of Death and Washing Machine is both terrifying and exhilarating. We were lucky to have as our guide Pilani Moyo, the owner of Shockwave and the first black Zimbabwean to own a rafting business on the Zambezi. He spends the off-season guiding on the greatest rivers in the world and has a home in Colorado, in the United States.

More sedate by far was the four-hour dinner cruise we took on the lush upper reaches of the river, a mile or two upstream from the Falls. I recall taking a “booze cruise” here years ago – on a rusty junk of a vessel filled with rowdy passengers drinking warm beer. This was very different. Our boat, Pure Africa’s Zambezi Explorer, was a sumptuous three-deck vessel with designer sofas, hand-woven Ndebele-patterned chairs and a staff of mixologists, waiters and chefs in addition to the boat captain.Dinner was served at sunset as we cruised past long-tusked elephants grazing on the riverbanks, with hippos snorting in the shallows and a fiery sun setting over towering palm trees upriver. To our immediate right was Zambia, with Botswana, Namibia and Angola beyond. My all-American children were wide-eyed with wonder, and I thought of all the fellow Zimbabweans I had met who had opted to return home. As I write this, I am looking at properties online and thinking seriously about following them. Something must come up.

Essentials

Douglas Rogers was a guest of Askari Safari (askarisafari.com), which offers a five-night Victoria Falls tour taking in Zambezi National Park from £4,000pp. It includes a guided visit to the Falls, three adrenaline activities, a river cruise plus all breakfasts and dinners, but not flights. In 2025, he and Askari’s owner, Steve Taylor, will lead Storyteller 2025 – a two-week literary safari with talks by game guides, writers and artists.

Five reasons to visit Victoria Falls

Wildlife wonders

The Falls themselves are wild – but the resurgent animal population is another reason to visit. The region comprises two national parks and is on the edge of the great Hwange game reserve. For the best viewing close to town, take a guided or self-drive trip to Chamabonda Vlei, a narrow plain dotted with watering holes within Zambezi National Park. While you are in town, book a visit to the Victoria Falls Wildlife Trust (vicfallswildlifetrust.org), a non-profit organisation that rescues animals wounded by poachers.

Luxurious lodgings

The refurbished Victoria Falls Hotel offers the ultimate in Edwardian era refinement (victoriafallshotel.com; doubles from £420 per night). Ilala, with its gardens and thatched roofs, has a timeless, classic safari lodge feel (ilalalodge.com; doubles from £380). Newly opened Drift Inn is a budget nine-room B&B offering great breakfasts, artisanal coffee, a swimming pool and a yoga, massage and reflexology studio (driftinnvicfalls.com; doubles from £75).

Glorious food

Chef, restaurateur and cookbook author Sarah Lilford serves up Zimbabwe’s most exciting culinary offering at Dusty Road (dustyroad.africa). The daughter of white farmers who lost their land in the early 2000s, she set up her restaurant in working-class Chinotimba township offering authentic Zim dishes – beef stew, chicken in peanut butter, grilled bream – cooked on wood fires. Enjoy them on the veranda or under trees in the backyard. Don’t miss the dried mopani worm snack or the vodka cocktail made with baobab powder. In town, the Three Monkeys (3monkeyszw.com) serves a great tomahawk steak. Next morning, order a flat white at Loretta’s Coffee and Smoothie Caravan on Reynard Road.

4. Thrills and spills

Victoria Falls is Africa’s adventure sports capital. Shockwave (shockwavevictoriafalls.com) offers exhilarating white-water rafting trips, while Wild Horizons (wildhorizons.co.za) operates the heart-in-mouth gorge swing and zip-line right in front of its uber-stylish Lookout Café (thelookoutcafe.com). Shearwater (shearwaterbungee.com) pioneered bungee jumping off the Vic Falls bridge. For more leisurely river adventures, Pure Africa (pure.africa/experiences) offers elegant sunrise, sunset and dinner cruises on the Zambezi in a fleet of luxury vessels.

Art and history

Renowned artist and conservationist Larry Norton has a gallery at the Victoria Falls Hotel (larrynorton.co.za), showcasing his giant, hyper-realistic wildlife paintings. The hotel’s open-air Stone Dynamics Gallery (stonedynamicsgallery.com) displays and sells the work of some of Zimbabwe’s leading sculptors, including Dominic Benhura. Meanwhile, historian Chris Worden from Footsteps of Livingstone (footstepsoflivingstone.com) gives a mesmerising one-hour talk on the life of David Livingstone that could almost be a one-man play in London’s West End. The Telegraph

Hwange

Hwange residents petition parliament over coal mining health risks

Published

1 month ago

December 11, 2024

VicFallsLive

BY NOKUTHABA DLAMINI

The Greater Whange Residents Trust has presented a petition to the Parliament of Zimbabwe, drawing attention to the health risks associated with coal mining in Hwange.

The trust, which advocates for the welfare and interests of people in Hwange, highlights the need for urgent action to protect residents from the harmful effects of coal dust pollution.

According to the trust, the Pneumonoconiosis Act (Chapter 15:08), which was enacted to protect workers in dusty occupations, does not provide adequate protection for ordinary residents who are also affected by coal dust pollution.

The trust argues that the Act is “exclusionary” and was not designed to benefit ordinary residents, who are not eligible for regular medical checks to determine the impact of coal dust on their health.

Below is the full petition that was submitted to Parliament:

DRAW the attention of the House to the following:

1. The Constitution mandates the Parliament of Zimbabwe to make laws, carry out executive oversight and discharge a representative role, as well as protect the Constitution and democratic governance in Zimbabwe.

2. Section 117(2) of the Constitution, inter alia, mandates Parliament to make laws for the peace, order and good governance of Zimbabwe.

3. Section 8 of the Constitution sets out the objectives to guide all institutions and agencies of the State in the formulation and implementation of policies that will lead to the establishment, enhancement and promotion of a sustainable, just, free and democratic society in which people enjoy prosperous, happy and fulfilling lives.

4. Greater Whange Residents Trust is a Hwange-basedTrust which advocates for the welfare and interests of people in Hwange.

5. The town of Hwange is home to over 50 000 residents. These include men, women and children that are not employed as miners.

6. Coal mining is a key industry in that town and impacts on both the residents and the environment of Hwange town and beyond. Hwange is also surrounded by land which falls under the National Parks.

7. The Pneumonoconiosis Act (Chapter 15:08) came into operation on 1 August 1971. The Act remains in force. The long title of the Act gives as its objects the following: An Act to provide for the control and administration of persons employed in dusty occupations; and to provide for matters incidental to or connected with the foregoing. (emphasis added).

8. The Act was designed to respond to health issues affecting those employed in dusty occupations. Naturally,it is ill-equipped to respond to issues of stakeholders beyond this categorisation as stated by the lawmaker.

9. Mining in Hwange consists of both open cast and underground mining operations. Coal mining creates dust and dusty conditions that affect not just those employed by the coal mines. It affects communities that live on and around the mines.

10. Section 56 of the Constitution provides that all persons are equal before the law and have a right to equal protection and benefit of the law.

11. Your petitioners submit that ordinary residents of Hwange that are not employed in the coal mines are not benefiting from the provisions of the Act as currently framed. For instance, those directly employed in coal mines are eligible for regular medical checks under the Act to determine the impact of coal dust on their health, particularly the heart and kidneys. Ordinary residents are not beneficiaries of such tests. The Act was not designed for their benefit. It was exclusionary from the start.

12. Residents that are not employees of coal mines are therefore susceptible to health risks associated with coal mining, without the protection of the law. With the increase in coal and related mining activities, the number of persons that are not subject to the protection of the law thanks to the crafting of the Act has also increased. It is desirable that the Act be reviewed to embrace the protection of all persons that stay or live in environments that are subjected to coal mining dust. It may also be worthwhile for Parliament to consider how the Act could enjoin coal miners to contribute towards the reduction of coal dust, to enhance the health of residents.

13. Your petitioners are aware that section 73 of the Constitution guarantees their right to an environment that is not harmful to their health or well-being, and to have their environment protected for the benefit of present and future generations. In this regard, the State must ensure the progressive realisation of this right by residents of Hwange.

WHEREFORE your petitioners humbly pray as follows:

That the Parliament of Zimbabwe to exercises its constitutional mandate to

1. Inquire into the nature and extent of the threat posed to residents due to the dust pollution;

2. Review the fairness of the Pneumonoconiosis Act [Chapter 15:08] to non-employees of the coal mining industry that reside in coal mining areas; and

3. Make recommendations on the review of the Act given the current situation in coal mining areas.

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Zimparks defends elephant culling: ‘Conservationists are greedy and misinformed’

Published

1 month ago

December 2, 2024

VicFallsLive

BY STAFF REPORTER

In a recent interview with VicFallsLive reporter Nokuthaba Dlamini, Tinashe Farawo of the Zimbabwe Parks and Wildlife Management Authority (Zimparks) addressed the controversy surrounding elephant culling in Zimbabwe.

Farawo responded to criticism from conservationists on social media, who have condemned Zimparks for their handling of problem elephants in communities.

The debate sparked after an incident in Victoria Falls two months ago, where an elephant was killed in the suburbs, and others were killed in Hwange town.

Farawo defended Zimparks’ actions, stating that communities are under distress due to elephants causing unwarranted curfews, disrupting daily life, and even resulting in fatalities.

He criticized conservationists for slamming the idea of shooting to kill problem elephants, accusing them of being “greedy lots” who are more interested in fundraising than providing solutions.

Below are excerpts from the interview, where Farawo shares his perspective on the matter:

We don’t deal with activists, this is activism they are not conservationists, they are just activists

What we do, let me give you an example we have a hunting quota of 500 elephants every year, and this hunting quota has been in place since 1991, we have never exhausted that quota

We have a management quota that is in place there are many things that we can do. Do they know the definition of culling for example?

When we react to distress calls when communities tell us that there are elephants and lions there and we respond and when we respond we do an assessment and when human life is under threat we are left with no option, but to eliminate

In respect of the two incidences one which happened here in Victoria Falls and the other incident which happened in Hwange, you can actually see that the elephants were in the streets in communities and when we go there, we do an assessment.

Communities in Hwange last month were put on an unwanted curfew by the elephants. For two weeks, no one was going to school, no one was leaving his or her homestead

We receive those distress calls and we go there to restore order and the options that we have is either we scare the animals away, but if human life is under threat, we are left with no option.

We are no apologetic, that’s our job, our laws provide for that.

But because they don’t that and they don’t know the definition of culling and because they are activists and if they were conservationists they would understand what l am saying.

They are just raising their own money in the name our elephants, for their benefits.

They are just greedy and they have never given us options or alternatives to say what is it can we can do with the crisis.

We have a lot of biodiversity projects around our parks, do they say anything about it.

Communities lose their lives l, we have never heard them, even a condolence message.

Hwange

Wildlife Conservation: A double-edged sword for Hwange communities

Published

2 months ago

November 28, 2024

VicFallsLive

Hwange woman attacked by a crocodile in Matetsi River. She is footing her own medical bill

BY BRENDA NCUBE

In the heart of Matabeleland North’s Hwange district, wildlife conservation has become a contentious issue.

While the area is renowned for its rich biodiversity and generating substantial revenue, local communities are struggling to reap the benefits.

For communal farmers like Binwell Sibanda, the presence of wild animals has become a constant threat to their livelihoods.

“We rely heavily on farming, but these animals destroy our crops and livestock every year,” Sibanda lamented.

“We expect National Parks and CAMPFIRE (Communal Areas Management Programme for Indigenous Resources) to control wildlife and not let them roam freely in communal areas.”

Nicholas Tembo, another affected farmer, emphasized the need for compensation for losses incurred due to human-wildlife conflict. “We should be reimbursed for our losses if wildlife destroys our crops or kills livestock,” he said.

The communities are also demanding that park authorities take responsibility in cases of human-wildlife attacks, including paying medical bills, funeral expenses, and supporting victims’ dependents.

Furthermore, the villagers are advocating for a quota for game meat to alleviate hunger and reduce poaching. “The park rangers can cull the animals and share the meat with the community,” Tembo suggested.

However, the communities are frustrated with CAMPFIRE, feeling that the program benefits the association running it rather than the communities themselves.

They are calling for CAMPFIRE to devise programs that channel funds from hunting trophies to benefit the communities, such as rural electrification and drilling boreholes.

The villagers are also seeking a more nuanced approach to addressing poaching, considering the motivations behind it. “If someone is caught poaching or snaring, the law should consider what they plan to do with the animal,” Tembo said.

As the debate surrounding the Parks and Wildlife Amendment Bill (H.B.1, 2024) continues, communities are keep on voicing concerns over compensation for victims of wildlife attacks and seeking clarity on how the Zimbabwe Parks and Wildlife Authority plans to handle these compensations.

They are also demanding sovereignty over wildlife management, advocating for local authorities to take the lead.

Amidst the thriving tourism activities in the area, it is ironic that communities bordering national parks live in poverty. As Tembo emphasized, “It’s time for us to benefit from wildlife conservation and tourism.”