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Towards formalized adaptive management in succulent valley bushveld.

This study was designed to provide the means for implementing formal scientific vegetation management 1n the succulent valley



bushveld of the eastern Cape, South Africa.



Nowhere in the world has a detailed, effective and practical veld



management system being developed entirely from research, and



even the most successful management systems rely heavily on the



intuition of people. A process, formally called 'adaptive



management', combines this intuition with scientific testing and



the overall objective of this study was to provide a framework



for formalized adaptive management in succulent valley bushveld.



On analyzing the process of adaptive management, the following



knowledge 'tools' were identified: (i) a management system for



immediate implementation; (ii) a technique for vegetation



assessment; (iii) a technique for monitoring vegetation change;



(iv) a technique for monitoring forage use and recovery; (v) a



list of key forage species; (vi) a model to set initial stocking



rates; (vii) a method of recording essential information; and



(viii) a database of ecological principles.



Providing these 'tools' became the goals of this study. These



topics covered almost all facets of rangeland science, and the



approach was to address these in a 'top down' manner, rather than



sub-optimize by specializing on anyone component.



Most of the 'tools' were achieved to a greater or lesser extent



and are presented as a series of publications. However, a



central tool, that for monitoring vegetation change, remains



outstanding despite comprehensive testing of a range of



traditional botanical methods. Indeed, critical review revealed



that this 'missing tool' is a problem which is common in all



vegetation communities in South Africa - despite the impression



created by vegetation researchers that adequate techniques are



indeed available. This is serious because land managers are not



able to evaluate the impact of their efforts and the government



is unable to monitor the effectiveness of their research and



extension services, costing millions of public monies annually.



The implication also, is that vegetation cannot be managed



scientifically (management implies monitoring).



Either formal adaptive management is not practicable, or



researchers are operating from an inappropriate paradigm;



specifically that of providing techniques for their research



projects and claiming that these (or derivatives of these) are



adequate for farm or regional scale monitoring.



More generally, research has often become an end in it's self,



with research quality being judged by criteria which are of



little significance to the real world and which damage



efficiency. Perhaps, the real value of vegetation research lies



in the experiential learning which the researcher gains not the



inevitably parochial results. / Thesis (Ph.D.)-University of Natal, Pietermaritzburg, 1993.

Identiferoai:union.ndltd.org:netd.ac.za/oai:union.ndltd.org:ukzn/oai:http://researchspace.ukzn.ac.za:10413/10902
Date January 1993
CreatorsStuart-Hill, Gregory Colin.
ContributorsTainton, Neil M.
Source SetsSouth African National ETD Portal
Languageen_ZA
Detected LanguageEnglish
TypeThesis

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