Environmental policy and administrative management

Kalakamati-Mantenge Conservation Trust has been allocated a 10 ha plot to preserve Mantenge rock paintings, well and its environs through ecotourism related activities. Interestingly, Mantenge rock paintings, the wheal together with the rock art and well have been declared a national monument by the Department of Museums and Art Gallery due to the San paintings in some of the rocks found there. The paintings are being defaced by people who visit the area for religious purposes especially as some make fire under the rock art. In a bid to control entry and vandalism, through the support of North East District Council the community enclosed the area with a The area has a natural occurring 30m deep well in the rock which according to archeological sayings going abound dates back to 200BC. The well was historically used by to water the community in the past but currently it has been put to best use by baboon troops that reside on the kopje and the religious groups that draw water for healing purposes. The area has abundant and diverse tree species ideal for conservation and management for wise use. Moreover, the tree species are ideal for providing a carbon sink with further development ushering an opportunity for leisure and tourism. In a bid to conserve the area, the Trust has decided to establish a botanical garden in the area as a way of conserving the flora and fauna of the area. A botanical garden is defined here as an institution holding documented collections of living and/or preserved plant accessions containing functional units of heredity of actual or potential value for purposes such as scientific research, education, public display, conservation, sustainable use, tourism and recreational activities, production of marketable plant-based products and services for improvement of human well-being. The history of botanical gardens is closely linked to the history of botany itself. The botanical gardens of the 16th and 17th centuries were medicinal gardens, but the idea of a botanical garden changed to encompass displays of the beautiful, strange, new and sometimes economically important plant trophies being returned from the European colonies and other distant lands. Later, in the 18th century, they became more educational in function, demonstrating the latest plant classification systems devised by botanists working in the associated herbaria as they tried to order these new treasures. Then, in the 19th and 20th centuries, the trend was towards a combination of specialist and eclectic collections demonstrating many aspects of both horticulture and botany. Now in the 21st century they could be used further as carbon stocks to mitigate the adverse effects of climate change. The role that botanic gardens play is very varied around the world; as institutions they range from small, poorly supported gardens functioning mainly as public parks and recreational sites to major scientific organizations involved in plant research, horticulture, training, environmental education and conservation. Those countries especially developed countries that have well developed botanic gardens capable of functioning as broadly-based botanical resource centres find them invaluable institutions capable of playing an important part in the scientific, environmental and cultural life of the country. The importance and roles of botanic gardens in the conservation and sustainable use of plants is highlighted in the International Agenda for Botanic Gardens in Conservation (Wyse Jackson and Sutherland, 2000). The International Agenda provides a useful framework for most botanic gardens to use to guide the development of their policies and practices to address local, national and international concerns about biodiversity conservation, environmental education and global sustainability. The proposal of establishing the botanical garden is relevant to the GEF/SGP Country Programme Strategy because it is in line with the SGP OP5. Immediate objective 5 is on supporting the conservation and enhancement of carbon stocks through sustainable management and climate proofing of land use, land use change and forestry.

Botswana