Game Park Deal Defended. (17 December, 1996)

Mpumalanga Parks Board (MPB) Chief Executive Officer Alan Gray has hit back at critics of the provincial conservation agency's recently announced deal with the Dubai-based Dolphin Group, saying they were ignoring the realities facing South African nature conservation. Gray said commercialisation was essential to ensure the future of the province's game parks and reserves. In other southern African countries such as Zimbabwe, Gray said, conservation funding had been slashed to the bone. The same fate awaited conservation in South Africa unless new sources of funding could be found.

The morale of provincial conservation officials was low, and budget cuts had resulted in staff dissatisfaction in other provinces, Gray said. He said Mpumalanga was one of the few provinces capable of running a highly motivated and professional conservation parastatal. Gray firmly denied the accusations that the MPB had 'sold' the province's reserves such as Blyde River Canyon, and the Songimvelo Reserve, adding that no development undertaken by the joint-venture company formed between MPB and Dolphin, would be allowed to commence without the full approval of his board.

'All we have done,' he said, 'is facilitate a means to responsibly exploit the commercial potential of Mpumalanga's publicly owned reserves and, in the process have ensured the future creation of thousands of jobs and financial opportunities for economically deprived people living along the reserve borders.' Gray said Mpumalanga's parks were 'largely undeveloped honeypots, which at the moment contribute little in the way of jobs and resources to the province's poor rural communities and to economic wealth for the province as a whole.' 'We have no option but to ensure that our products contribute towards the upliftment of the communities surrounding our reserves.'

Gray disputed reports that Dolphin would only pick up the tab for the board's budget deficit for the next five years. 'In fact,' Gray pointed out, 'the Dolphin Group has undertaken to underwrite the Mpumalanga Parks Board's future budget for a period of 50 years in a deal that, at current predictions, could top R12-billion.' He added that, over the initial 50-year period, it was also predicted that the deal would have a multiplier effect, providing in excess of R55-billion to the local economy, based on Satour tourist spending figures.

'This is a unique, historic and visionary agreement that has secured the future of conservation in Mpumalanga - but now we are being crucified. We should let history be the judge,' he added. One of the main reasons for choosing to form the joint-venture company with Dolphin, Gray said, was because of that company's excellent track record of operating in conservation areas elsewhere in Africa.