From pre-colonial leadership through to the Apartheid regime, local traditional authorities played an essential role in natural resource management throughout rural South Africa. The advent of democracy in 1994, however, generated much confusion over the modern function of traditional leaders in many rural communities, specifically regarding natural resource regulation. By understanding local perceptions of governance regimes, resource use initiatives can use and enhance institutions already in place to combat further over-harvesting. The aim of this study was therefore to determine the perceived functions of traditional and democratically elected community leaders in the governance of firewood harvesting and compare perceptions between interviewed leaders and their community members. The study was conducted in six villages spanning two chieftaincies and four municipal wards in Bushbuckridge Local Municipality, Mpumalanga Province. In-depth interviews were conducted with the following local leaders: the chiefs from the two chieftaincies, the nduna (headman) from each village, the ward councillor from each ward and three members of the Community Development Forum from each village. Five community focus group sessions were also run in each village to determine local community perspectives on wood availability and governance regimes. It was found that the majority of respondents, from both individual interviews and focus groups, believed that firewood availability had decreased in recent years. In addition, 21 of the 30 focus groups (across both chieftaincies) suggested that there was insufficient firewood to meet the needs of their village now. While all interviewed parties across both chieftaincies regarded the chief as the ultimate authority in firewood management, his actual system of regulation as well as the perceived roles and responsibilities of subsidiary leaders appears highly differentiated between the chieftaincies. Results also indicate that although there is some ambiguity around community-level firewood regulation, these instances of uncertainty are village-specific and could indicate diminished village-level enforcement of regulation. Overall, however, other lines of evidence evince a general weakening of traditional local control across all the villages. Some authors maintain that this deterioration of village firewood management stems from community confusion and/or contestation over the roles of local leaders. However, I argue that reduced government budgets as well as leader’s empathy for poor firewood-dependent households have also contributed to the increasingly relaxed implementation of strict firewood systems. With this in mind, future policy decisions need to consider ways in which to reduce rural over-harvesting, either by increasing the affordability of alternate energies or by implementing strategies that allow for continued firewood harvesting but in more sustainable ways. Recommendations that detail such approaches are presented for the study region.

A thesis submitted to the Faculty of Science, University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg, in fulfilment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy Johannesburg 29 September 2017 / As in other developing countries in Africa, unsustainable harvesting of fuelwood in South Africa has become a matter of concern among policy makers and researchers. This is despite the country having the highest electrification access in the continent, because the majority of rural households in communal woodland areas cannot afford to cook on electric stoves, due to high levels of poverty and unemployment,. Moreover, relevant institutions do not have the capacity to monitor compliance with harvesting rules, resulting in resource users harvesting livewood due to the scarcity of deadwood with almost impunity, despite this constituting an illegal activity under the traditional management rules. Other interventions such as woodlots have largely been unsuccessful in addressing the unsustainable harvesting problems. Thus, researchers have recommended that rotational coppice harvesting be implemented by the local institutions in partnership with local resource users as a potential strategy to sustainably provide fuelwood, while addressing incapacity problems in terms of the shortage of physical and human resources in the relevant institutions. The majority of South Africans using fuelwood reside in the savanna biome which covers 34% of the country. Savanna tree species generally coppice (resprout) easily and this provides an opportunity for rotational harvesting strategies, involving local resource users. Although ecological data suggest that rotational harvesting of coppice regrowth can be sustainable, rotational harvesting of coppice has not gained popularity in South Africa, because of tenurial and institutional challenges in communal areas. Thus, whether or not rotational harvesting strategies are feasible in communal woodland is yet to be established. This thesis reports the findings of a study that assessed the implementation of a rotational harvesting scheme in selected rural communities. In order to investigate the ecological and socio-economic feasibility of community-based coppice management (CBCM), four communities across Limpopo and Mpumalanga Provinces (Thorndale, Peninghotsa, Homu and Makhuva) in South Africa were selected based on a set of criteria, and involved in a coppice management trial. The harvesting trial was implemented over a one year period by the local traditional leadership in partnership with local resource users and relevant government institutions, facilitated by the researcher. The trial was successfully piloted through one iteration of the adaptive management cycle in the first two villages. The intervention entailed rotational harvesting of specified stem size classes and species in blocks (coupes), according to consensus-based rules that were enforced by local institutions in cooperation with resource users. The study period was not long enough to monitor the rotational harvesting of coppice per se, but enabled the creation of coppice stools and a community-based system for rotational harvesting of wood resources. Both qualitative and quantitative methods were used in this action research study to assess fuelwood harvesting and use patterns, ecological sustainability, social feasibility, and the adequacy of local resource-governance systems to implement CBCM, over the course of the first year of the intervention. Data such as energy mix used in the households, time spent acquiring fuelwood, compliance with harvesting rules, perceived cooperation between institutions, and socio-economic information were collected using questionnaires. Data were collected in two survey periods, the first occurring in early January 2014 before the trial started, and the second one from April 2014, after it had started, to January 2015. The fuelwood resource base, coppicing, and wood harvesting patterns in the village communal woodlands were assessed before and during the trial in fixed 100 m2 circular plots. Allometric equations were used to convert the observed density of stems and coppice shoots into wood biomass. The measured growth rates of coppice shoots were used to estimate the amount of time that would be required for shoots to reach the allowable harvest diameter of 4–9 cm, and hence the number of years required for one harvest rotation between coupes. These data, along with the measured rates of self-thinning of shoots and village wood demand, were used to make projections of fuelwood supply by coppice and unharvested stems in the village coupes over a number of harvest rotations. The effectiveness of management under traditional management rules and that of CBCM were assessed in focus group discussions, interviews and questionnaires with the local traditional leaders and key informant interviews with government rangers before and during the trial. Levels of compliance by resource users with the agreed CBCM rules were high in Thorndale and Peninghotsa because they were given an opportunity to decide and agree on harvesting rules that were conducive to their harvesting practices. Although the intervention did not change the energy use patterns in the households in these villages, local resource users spent significantly less time acquiring fuelwood than they did prior to the intervention, thus reducing the opportunity costs of wood harvesting. There was a noticeable decline in the incidence of illegal harvesting of fuelwood by “outsiders” due to greater vigilance by resource users and community-based monitors as a result of the successful implementation of CBCM in these villages. Based on the growth rate data averaged across species, coppice shoots would reach the harvestable diameter of 4 cm in 3 years in Thorndale and 4 years in Penninghotsa. The difference may be explained by species differences in these villages, e.g. Terminalia sericea which coppices vigorously was one of the predominant species recorded in Thorndale. The successful implementation of the trial in Thorndale and Pennighotsa in the first year of the intervention is attributed to a number of socio-economic factors, including relatively small and homogenous populations, innovative and adaptive local TAs which were flexible and had encouraged community participation and supportive resource users who had positive perceptions of their leadership and the project. This is in contrast to Homu 14B and Makhuva which were characterised by larger, more heterogeneous populations, inflexible leadership who were incapacitated by lack of physical resources, lack of transparency by the leadership, and negative attitudes and perceptions of resources users. This study demonstrates that community-based coppice management is potentially applicable and feasible for sustainable provision of fuelwood in communal areas, and identified under what conditions it is most likely to succeed. / MT2018

Forest and woodland ecosystems provide a variety of natural resources such as fuelwood, brushwood and kraal posts to local communities, as well as possess important cultural and spiritual value. However, many forests and woodlands worldwide have been unsustainably used and managed. Thus, under pressure from the international conservation community to recognise the importance of people's relationships with their surrounding natural environment, particularly for the natural resources it can provide, and given a move away from the management of forests and woodlands for sustained yields, and according to simple cause and effect models, in favour of systems approaches, South Africa has developed some of the most progressive natural resource management policies in the world. Nevertheless, for these policies to be sensitive to local contexts, there remains a need for a better understanding of how local people in different contexts, determine forest and woodland ecosystems to be of use to them, and what 'usefulness' means to different groups of resources users. This is a case study, which examines the role of fuelwood, brushwood and kraal posts in the rural livelihoods of the people of Machibi village, located in the Eastern Cape province of South Africa, through people's preferences for particular landscapes and species, accessed for these purposes, and the trade-offs people make between resource availability and resource accessibility. Key objectives of the study are to 1) determine the preferred landscapes and species for fuelwood, brushwood and kraal posts at Machibi, 2) determine the landscapes and species actually used for fuelwood, brushwood and kraal posts, and 3) with the help of a conceptual model, and using iterative modelling as a tool, determine the factors that influence people's harvesting strategies in terms of the costs and benefits associated with the different landscape and species options. On the basis of this knowledge, the study provides some guiding principles for the better use and management of these landscapes and species for fuelwood, brushwood and kraal posts. An innovative research approach and methodology that integrates social and ecological systems, works across disciplines, and draws on different types of knowledge is used to develop and test a conceptual model of the harvesting strategies of fuelwood and kraalwood users at Machibi. Participatory methods such as workshops, participatory resource mapping, ranking exercises and trend-lines were used to tap into local knowledge while plotless vegetation sampling and GIS maps were used to capture the scientific information. Results showed that people did not always use the landscapes and species they preferred. However, the local people did behave in a rational manner by weighing up the returns from harvesting and accessibility costs associated with the respective options available to them, before selecting the option(s) associated with the greatest net benefits. At the landscape level, people made trade-offs between the returns from harvesting and the accessibility costs of using particular landscapes in addition to costs associated with the physical work of harvesting fuelwood, brushwood or kraal posts from these landscapes. At the species level, people made trade-offs between the returns from harvesting and the accessibility costs of harvesting particular species for fuelwood, brushwood and kraal posts, or the costs of commercial alternatives. Costbenefit factors that influenced people's resource use patterns also differed across landscapes and species for fuelwood, brushwood and kraal posts, respectively. Consequently, a range of diverse and flexible management options and strategies is recommended for the wise use and management of these landscapes and species, focused on short, medium and long term goals. These strategies examine the use of cost - benefit incentives to influence people’s landscape and species use patterns.