South Africa gets new Grasslands National Park in Eastern Cape

South Africa has a new national park in the Eastern Cape highlands, where more than 10 000 hectares of grassland will be protected to safeguard unique biodiversity and a strategic water source area.

Minister of Forestry, Fisheries and the Environment David Maynier declared 18 properties, covering a total of 10 225.9242 hectares, as the Grasslands National Park on Friday.

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Situated between Nqanqarhu and Rhodes, the park will help protect under-represented grassland ecosystems and part of the Eastern Cape Drakensberg Strategic Water Source Area, which is important for water security, biodiversity and livelihoods linked to the region’s agricultural land.

Maynier has assigned management of the new park to South African National Parks (SANParks) in terms of section 38(1)(aA) of the National Environmental Management: Protected Areas Act, 2003.

“The declaration of the Grasslands National Park is an important step in protecting one of South Africa’s least-protected biomes and a strategic water source landscape,” Minister Maynier said.

It also demonstrates how conservation and compatible productive land use can reinforce one another through voluntary, long-term partnerships.

Landowners retain ownership

The park has been established primarily through biodiversity stewardship, an approach that allows participating landowners to retain ownership of their properties while committing to agreed conservation and management arrangements.

Conservation-compatible agricultural activities can continue, allowing the protection of ecologically important landscapes alongside working agricultural land and the livelihoods it supports.

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Maynier said the park was the first national park in South Africa established primarily through a biodiversity stewardship model.

This is the first national park established primarily through a biodiversity stewardship model. This initiative is an example of how inclusive partnerships can drive large-scale conservation success.

Plans to grow the conservation landscape

WWF South Africa played a leading role in co-ordinating the establishment of the park alongside the Department of Forestry, Fisheries and the Environment, SANParks and a range of other partners.

WWF South Africa CEO Dr Morné du Plessis said the ambition was for the park to expand significantly over the next decade.

“The ambition is for the park to evolve and grow into a Mega Living Landscape over the next decade in the order of hundreds of thousands of hectares. We thank those landowners who are the champions of this new park,” Du Plessis said.

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“With their pioneering commitment, this flagship initiative is now not only a reality, but poised to scale up as a model of coexistence between people and nature.”

The declaration marks a new step in efforts to protect South Africa’s grassland ecosystems while showing how conservation partnerships can work alongside sustainable agricultural land use.