the role of tourism in natural resource management in the okavango ...

national level, political, social and economic institutions, both within and outside of
their control. The development of mass tourism in the Delta has led to changes in
land use in the area as tourism is the chief economic activity in the region. Hence,
the further development of the industry is a priority for the Botswana Government,
regardless of its impact on local communities and subsistence strategies. Tourism in
the Okavango Delta is directly dependent upon the utilisation of the region's natural
resources of wildlife, water and natural vegetation areas for the industry. As such,
tourism has increasingly impacted upon the way, and degree to which, these
resources are managed and utilised, hence being identified as a key factor affecting
the resource sector. As a result, the region offers much scope for the study of the
impact of tourism on local social, economic, cultural, environmental and natural
resource structures.
The Okavango Delta presents a unique opportunity to study the relationship
between tourism and the utilization and management of a region's natural resources,
to observe the negotiation and competition which occur between global and local
utilization patterns, and to review the inevitable transformation of local culture,
economy and physical landscape. As highlighted by Britton (1982, p. 331), "...when
a Third World country uses tourism as a development strategy, it becomes
enmeshed in a global system over which it has little control." Furthermore, "... many
publications in the tourism literature attest to the widespread social, economic and
environmental effects of the global forces of international tourism in both
industrialised and developing nations" (Torres, 1996, p. 2).
A number of tourism, natural resource and related socio-economic studies have
been carried out in the Okavango Delta region over the past decade or so, many
undertaken by the University of Botswana in Gaborone, and more recently, the Harry
Oppenheimer Okavango Research Centre (HOORC) in Maun. The majority of
tourism studies in the region have been synonymous with investigations into the
socio-economic and cultural impacts of tourism development on the area and its
inhabitants (Appendix One). Reflecting this, they typically focus on issues such as
the loss of traditional cultural practices and changes to social, economic and
infrastructural structures brought about by tourism development in the area. Most
natural resource studies conducted in the Delta tend to concentrate on factors of
resource conservation and degradation, with specific focus on changes in wildlife
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