Director's Report on the Wild Plants Dialogue

14 Mar 2022

Director’s Report on the Dialogue on Wild Plant Opportunities in Africa’s Wildlife Economy

Plants’ contribution to Africa’s wildlife economy: The cases of baobab, rooibos, and mangroves

In person & online - Tuesday, 01 March 2022 - Lanzerac Wine Estate, Stellenbosch, South Africa

First develop a ready market for a natural product, lower barriers to entry, and ensure sector-wide support and an adequate supply chain of the raw product. Where possible, do the groundwork using public funding. Then only start developing the wild plant products themselves, to prevent a possible crash of the market before things have even started.

These lessons learnt in developing the emerging baobab market were shared by Mr Gus le Breton of the African Baobab Alliance at a dialogue on the role that wild plants can play in developing Africa’s wildlife economy.

The event was hosted by the African Wildlife Economy Institute (AWEI) of Stellenbosch University (SU). Other speakers discussed the certification of wild-harvested products as being sustainably harvested, community benefit-sharing in the rooibos industry, and the potential for mangrove carbon as a wild plant service.

“Traditional definitions of wildlife technically exclude plants. However, as they provide both the habitat and the food for wild animals, they are obviously integral to the wildlife economy,” noted Mr le Breton, the CEO of African Plant Hunter based in Zimbabwe. “On a broader level, plants provide a range of economic opportunities for smallholders in Africa.”

He believes the role of wild-harvested plants in rural economies is systematically undervalued, because so much is used for non-commercial purposes, such as fuel, shelter, food, medicine, and shade. He noted: “It could cost billions of dollars per year for Africa if you removed the plants, and rural people then have to start paying for such goods and services.”

Despite its long tradition of use, African plants only hold a small proportion of the global market. He says adequate investment in the sector has been lacking. Its value is only recently being recognised. “Africa is the new frontier for natural ingredient research. The major global market trends are towards natural and healthy. This creates opportunities for small scale producers, especially for ones living in dryland areas.”

Markets for shea butter, argon oil and rooibos have a far bigger footprint than that of baobab. These have developed “organically” over the years. In comparison, Mr le Breton says that baobab was the “first natural ingredient to be deliberately and systematically developed for the benefit of smallholders in Africa.” These includes cosmetics, health snacks, juices, bars, jellies, and cereals.   

Mr le Breton noted that the PhytoTrade Africa Initiative for Southern African plants, established in 2001, first boosted baobab when the tree was chosen as one of four focal species to develop markets for. “It paved the way for the subsequent growth, but it was not enough to get it ‘over the line’.

In 2018 the African Baobab Alliance was formed as a sector support organisation. “It has taken 20 years get to a point where we now have various products on the market. Imagine what could be done if we only had 10% of what has been put into maize production and marketing,” he mused. “Much work is done to systematically promote the sector, but it is done with a limited budget.

“Some 500 000 US dollars was spent just to get approval for market access in the European Union. It will cost another 250 000 dollars to gain legal access to China, which is potentially a huge market. It is therefore currently still illegal to export baobab products to China.”

Gaining such market access is a process that those involved in African plants such as the marula are currently going through.

Although countries such as South Africa have policies that support the commercialisation of indigenous plants, others have laws that make things more difficult.

“In Zimbabwe, for instance, there is still an act on the suppression of witchcraft, which does not allow for the making of muti [traditional medicine] from indigenous plants.”

In this regard, Le Breton highlighted the importance of a sector support organisations, rather than relying on individual companies to engage with government to change the regulations.

Certification for fair and sustainable wild plant collection

“Around 60 000 plant species are used globally for medicinal purposes, of which 26,000 have well-documented medicinal and aromatic uses. Only around 3 000 species are traded internationally, with the majority being sourced through wild harvesting.” So said Ms Deborah Vorhies, AWEI interim COO and newly appointed CEO of the FairWild Foundation.

Her talk focused on the need for the responsible harvesting and trading of wild-harvested plants. “Among these count Africa’s baobab, rooibos, myrrh and frankincense.” There is much work to be done. For example, the conservation status of only 19% of all medicinal plants being used have so far been assessed. Of these, 10% are considered to be threatened.

Ms Vorhies highlighted how the FairWild Foundation champions the setting of an international sustainability standard for fair and sustainable wild collection, through the provision of a third party audited certification for wild harvested plant ingredients.

“It combines fair trade principles with ecological sustainability,” she noted. Twenty-five species from 14 countries have already received FairWild certification.

“People are increasingly interested in a product’s origins, its source to market traceability, and whether it was harvested sustainably. Fair and sustainable trade market awareness is growing. The millions of wild harvesters, who rely on wild plants for health and income, are, however, at the bottom of the economic totem pole.”

Much of the trade in plants are on an informal scale or is being underreported.

The FairWild standard and certification system aims to not only grow the market for wild-harvested plants, but to do so in a way which both conserves landscapes and enhances the livelihood of rural harvesting communities.

Sharing the benefits of rooibos

“The issue of land disposition in South Africa is making it difficult for communities to participate in the plant-based economy,” said Mr Sobanto Mzwakali, newly appointed programme coordinator for Resource Africa, during his session.

Importantly, sharing benefits is not always about monetary benefits to amend the wrongs of the past.

“At least give communities access to land to collect plant, without fear of being arrested,” he suggested.

Mr Mzwakali explained how the United Nation’s Nagoya Protocol on Access to Genetic Resources and the Fair and Equitable Sharing of Benefits Arising from their Utilization is playing a key role in changing the relationship between people and nature on the ground.

He explained: “The Nagoya Protocol is the first binding, international recognition of community protocols. Biocultural community protocols’ (BCPs, encompass a broad array of expressions, articulations, rules, and practices generated by communities to set out how they expect other stakeholders to engage with them.”

He noted how biocultural community protocols (BCPs) can be used by communities to articulate their rights and how they want to be approached in access and benefit sharing agreements.

“BCPs are not a prerequisite for access and benefit sharing agreements, but they are a valuable tool during the access and benefit sharing negotiations.”

By way of explanation, he noted how having one in place since 2013 has helped the Khoikhoi community – and the Cederberg Khoikhoi community in particular – in 2019 reach an agreement with the South African Rooibos Council regarding terms of benefit sharing and access to benefits reached.

“The community, through conclusion of the BCP, was able to access the internationally legal binding framework in terms of the Nagoya Protocol that established a set of rights for them as indigenous peoples and local communities over their genetic resources and traditional knowledge.”

The process was overseen by the South African Department of Forestry, Fisheries, and the Environment, and led to the Khoikhoi People’s Rooibos Access and Benefit-sharing (ABS) Biodiversity Trust being set up in 2019. On a less positive note, however, during question time, Mr Mzwakali that although money have already been paid from the rooibos industry to the Trust, communities have not yet received any funding. “The money is still sitting with government.”

Mr Mzwakali also highlighted the ABS Compliant Biotrade in South(ern) Africa Project as another example of BCP and ABS at work in the region. The Swiss-funded project aims to protect the rights of affected knowledge holders of buchu, marula, and Aloe ferox, and those stewarding the resource.

The potential for mangrove carbon

Prof Francis Vorhies, the AWEI Director, highlighted the role that the restoration of mangroves can play in not only protecting coastlines from storms, but also as a source of carbon sequestration. He highlighted successful projects implemented in Senegal and Kenya and the potential to do similar projects in Mozambique, Tanzania, and Nigeria.

In Senegal, the large French multinational, Danone, invested in a large-scale mangrove carbon project. In Kenya, a local coastal community has been able to certify its mangrove carbon and sell it.

Prof Vorhies said that the long shorelines of Mozambique and Tanzania as well as the massive Niger Delta in Nigeria have great potential for entering the market for mangrove carbon. In the case of Nigeria, the petroleum companies operating in the Delta may also be potential buyers.

Even South Africa has a potential to sequester carbon through restoration and conservation of mangroves. It has about 2000 ha of mangroves are found along the country’s north-eastern coastline including a small reserve in Durban.

“When Durban harbour was built, about 440 hectares of mangroves were lost,” Prof Vorhies noted. “Today the remaining 13.4 ha is a reserve that potentially could secure revenues from carbon credits to protect it and even increase its size.

Coastal communities across Africa and elsewhere face regulatory and technical barriers to entering the market for mangrove carbon. Securing certification for a mangrove restoration or conservation project is terribly complex and so new initiatives, such as Fair Carbon, are emerging to support these communities.

“The primary objective of the Fair Carbon programme is to help local projects take meaningful action to protect, restore, and expand their natural resources, biodiversity, and carbon stores.”

With technical support, mangrove carbon has real potential in Africa’s wildlife economy.

Participants

There were approximately 110 participants in the Wild Plants Dialogue – 50 in person at the Lanzerac Wine Estate in Stellenbosch and 60 online from across the continent and beyond. Both in person and online participants were able to engage in the discussions.

These discussions started with a warm welcome by Prof Danie Brink, Dean of the Faculty of AgriSciences. Prof Brink spoke of the need to connect conservation to the needs of rural people and cited the example of the Namaqualand where he comes from. The natural assets of this area are plant-based, notably the famous flower season, and ecotourism is important part of the area’s economy. However, leadership is required to both recognise that local communities are the key agents for conservation and to empower these communities to benefit from the use of their wild resources.

Following the four presentations, questions and comments from the room and from online were addressed by the presenters. Key issues raised included the following:

• The scalability of wild plant-based economies;
• Standards and process for smaller scale initiatives;
• Challenges facing sector organisation;
• The role of horticulture – wild vs semi-wild processes;
• Technical barriers to trade;
• Unsustainability of illegal harvesting;
• Role of land and use rights to enable sustainable harvesting;
• Empowering the youth through education; and
• Recognising the wild plant potential across Africa.

A take-home message for many participants was the fundamental importance of wild plants in the wildlife economy. As Mr le Breton explained, Africa’s magnificent wild animals depend on wild plants. Also, rural communities across the continent have for centuries depended on wild plants for food, medicine, building materials, fuel, and other necessities. Restoring landscapes and enhancing livelihoods requires a holistic approach to managing Africa’s natural capital – its wild animals and its wild plants.

More information on the event including a PDF of this report and the presentations is available here.