Mopane woodlands and the mopane worm

Project Aims and Research Activities

Project Aims

The project aims to increase income and subsistence value of mopane worms for poor rural people, by:

improving local returns to mopane worm harvesting, processing or marketing;
improving information flows concerning supply, demand, prices and quality of mopane worms;
increasing productivity while sustaining and promoting integrity of the mopane worm and mopane woodland resources through improved harvesting ;
developing low-cost technology and sustainable management methods of mopane worm farming by community groups.

Research activities

The project has five main areas of research that will contribute to achieving the aims listed above via a better understanding of mopane worm biology and its management as a valuable natural resource.

1. The management and utilisation of mopane woodland and mopane worms within the livelihoods of different poor rural people is to be investigated.

At present there are large gaps in knowledge about the contribution of mopane worm to the livelihoods of poor rural people, in terms of understanding of
(a) the various livelihood systems of poor people utilising mopane worms
(b) the location and relative importance of different categories of livelihood system among poor rural people
(c) the livelihood component interactions that determine opportunities and constraints for improved mopane worm utilisation
(d) local people's knowledge of mopane worm biology and woodland management

These knowledge gaps will be addressed at an early stage in the project to ensure that the geographical, social and technical foci of the project address the needs of the rural poor and to facilitate informed dialogue and partnership with harvesters and communities that the project will be working with.

2. Factors determining the size of mopane worm populations are to be investigated and management options for improved mopane worm harvests will be developed and made available to producer groups

One of the main problems facing harvesters of mopane worm is the unreliability of the resource: I. belina outbreaks are unpredictable and harvesters may have to travel long distances to gain access to them. This problem will be addressed by studies on the population biology and management of I. belina by drawing on published and unpublished data and by conducting a series of field experiments. Using this knowledge we will develop management options and technological interventions to increase harvests of mopane worms. The purpose of these studies is to provide a system whereby mopane worms can be produced efficiently and predictably in a domesticated manner such that wild harvests become largely unnecessary. A community-based mopane-worm farming project will be set up in participation with the Kgetsie ya Tsie community based organisation in Botswana, and this will be used to assess different management approaches and technological options.

3. Innovative approaches to strengthen the capacity of traditional and emerging institutions to determine access to, and use of, mopane woodlands and mopane worms will be investigated and documented

There are potential conflicts in the management of mopane woodlands over access to various woodland products. Conflicts over mopane worm harvesting have been reported as a result of local scarcity of mopane worms and increasing commercialisation of mopane worm harvesting. These conflicts threaten both the sustainability of harvesting of mopane worms (and of other woodland products) and access of the poor to these resources. We will investigate the extent, nature and effects of these conflicts in different communities and the institutional arrangements by which these conflicts may be addressed in order to inform stakeholders (members of communities utilising mopane woodland, CBOs, NGOs, local and central governments) of the potential effects of these conflicts and potential means of addressing them.

4. Information is to be made available to producer communities and other stakeholders on mopane worm market structure, enhanced worm storage and processing techniques, consumption trends, product development, and appropriate marketing strategies

There is limited understanding and incomplete documentation of the actual post-harvest activities in the mopane worm industry. We intend to synthesise information from three sources: existing information from the literature; supplementary information derived from primary data collection on the market system, value-addition processes and mopane market demand characteristics; and new knowledge about processing and marketing technologies derived from experimental procedures and consumer market research. This new information will be made available to relevant organisations and beneficiaries.

5. Policy implications of 'best practices' in mopane worm and woodland management, product utilisation and income generation made available to policy makers

Each set of research activities will have outputs targeted in the first instance towards intermediate recipients organisations and ultimate beneficiaries, the rural poor. Output 5 will encapsulate the implications of research results in policy briefs specifically for policy makers within central and decentralised governmental organisations. The appropriate levels may be national, provincial, and/or local, and targeted policy makers will include those involved in education in addition to the natural resource sector organisations. Other policy makers may also be targeted.
Due to the extensive nature of the mopane industry throughout the southern African region, it is likely that the policy implications will have an international dimension. Implications are likely to be relevant to regional economic organisation and integration, particularly concerning free-trade initiatives. Results will also be made available to policy makers in SADC member countries where I. belina occurs and to appropriate bilateral and multilateral international organisations. Results are also likely to be relevant to the relief of rural poverty in other regions in SSA, in Latin America and Asia.

Fieldwork locations

The experimental mopane worm farm will be located at Kgetsi ya Tsie, Tswapong Hills, Botswana. The biological research relating to the experimental farm will be conducted at Lerala in the Tswapong Hills (about 50 Kms WNW of Martins Drift border post with RSA). Additional research on mopane worm population biology and mopane woodland management will be conducted at Plumtree District in Matabeleland South, Zimbabwe, and at Messina Experimental Farm in the Northern Province of South Africa. These locations are in the heart of mopane worm outbreak areas and there is a high probability that outbreaks will occur in each of the three project years at each of these locations. Nevertheless, some flexibility on site locations for experimental work on mopane worm population biology may be necessary to account for erratic rainfall patterns or mopane worm outbreaks. Livelihoods research will be conducted in selected sites in Plumtree District and also in Masvingo Province in Zimbabwe. Marketing research will be conducted primarily in rural areas and consumption centres in Zimbabwe and RSA.

Project Beneficiaries

The primary and direct beneficiaries will be the poor farmers, landless families and rural artisans of mopane woodland-dwelling communities in Zimbabwe, South Africa and Botswana. Much of the research is likely to lead to results that prove regionally applicable. Therefore, similar social groups in other southern African countries, particularly Namibia, Angola and Mozambique, will also benefit.

Preliminary findings have suggested that mopane worms are of particular importance to women and children. Other evidence suggests that if household based mopane woodland activities are given increased economic and financial value, male members may appropriate both the derived income and access to the resource base and marketing networks. However, it is not clear under what social and environmental circumstances women and children are displaced in this manner. On the other hand, the Kgetsie ya Tsie experience would seem to indicate that organised women's groups can have a very strong and effective control over the use and management of the resources. This research promises to provide an opportunity to understand any such processes, thereby providing insights as to how female or child participation in harvesting, processing and trading activity can be maintained or increased.