Report: SANParks Gobal Envionmental Change Project: Habitat Change Summary Report

Change creates uncertainty and risk. Global environmental change epitomizes several threats and risks to human livelihoods. Numerous factors associate with and drive global environmental change including climate, disease, pollution, invasive species, over-harvesting and habitat change. In many instances, protected areas are considered the holy grail of ensuring environmental sustainability, even though continental patterns challenge this. Such areas are usually embedded in matrices of different land-uses, all of which may have different consequences for the environment. In South Africa, it is not clear how protected areas combat or are affected by global patterns of environmental change.

The definition of habitat change is problematic on two fronts. Firstly, habitat change can be viewed as primarily a consequence and/or indicator of the effects of other drivers of global environmental change. Secondly, desirable and undesirable habitat changes need to be separated. A range of causes of habitat change (sub-drivers) were identified across parks at a meeting of SANParks research staff at the Cape Research Centre. These include fire, absence of predators, over-grazing, mega-herbivore impact, park isolation, small park size, water abstraction, management for tourism, sedimentation, poaching and overexploitation. Two positive impacts on habitat were identified, i.e. land consolidation and restoration. One of the key conclusions from the discussion was that there is good evidence for the fact that habitat in parks is changing, but that the impact of this change on pattern and process in parks is poorly understood. Objectives were set in this context and the assessment focused on two kinds of data sets – vegetation measures (species composition) across parks as a primary index of habitat change, and large mammal abundances within parks as a broad index of a response to habitat change.