Can Environmental Injustices be Addressed in Conservation? Settlement History and Conservation-Induced Displacement in the Case of Lyanshulu in the Zambezi Region, Namibia

Abstract

The Zambezi Region of Namibia is known for its vast conservation landscape, which is part of the world’s largest transboundary conservation area – the Kavango Zambezi Transfrontier Conservation Area (KAZA TFCA). Less known are the settlement histories of the communities displaced from their villages during the planning and implementation of this conservation landscape. We reconstruct the settlement history of two families that lived on two islands in the Kwando River and the adjacent riverbanks in today’s Mudumu NP, and we describe the circumstances that led to the designation of a national park in this region and the subsequent conservation-induced displacement. The evicted families increasingly protest and legally contest estrangement from their ancestral land, which is now a protected area. We argue that current nature-conservation efforts can succeed only if issues of past and present environmental injustices are comprehensively addressed.