Evaluating people-environment trade-offs through low-tech intensification of livestock management in communal grazing systems in South Africa.

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In South Africa, communal rangelands (e.g. grassland, savanna and shrubland) systems provide a critical source of livelihood for smallholder farmers, primarily through their ability to support smallscale livestock production and through the provision of natural resources such as timber, fuelwood and thatching grass. These rangelands also provide other vital ecosystem services such as water and a habitat for biodiversity and contribute to climate resilience through carbon sequestration. However, their productivity is compromised both by their inherently low forage quality and rangeland degradation due to unregulated grazing, the spread of invasive alien plants (IAPs) and the encroachment of indigenous woody plants. All of these factors limit forage availability for livestock, reducing animal production and survival. This compromises the livelihood security of communal livestock farmers for whom livestock perform multiple roles, including the provision of meat, milk, draught and manure. The IAPs also affect the water supply and run-off to storage reservoirs throughout South Africa and their clearance has become a policy priority for the South African government.This proposal builds on existing research in Eastern Cape Province, working with six local communities in Matatiele to explore alternative rangeland management strategies that yield livelihood benefits for local people as well as improved ecosystem benefits. Specifically, we will test the role of intensive grazing and corralling of community livestock, in conjunction with the removal of IAPs to increase primary production of grassland, soil carbon and fertility and water availability, as well as improve livestock productivity. As part of this we propose the novel use of the removed IAPs as a soil amendment and as a supplemental feed for livestock. In order to link these different production outcomes we will develop an integrated model of livestock and rangeland production. We will use the outcomes of this model to explore the potential trade-offs between local people and their environment and between different groups of stakeholders (e.g. between conservationists and local farmers and between different groups of farmers) in the context of clearly defined 'scenarios' for the use of communal rangelands, which will be co-developed with local stakeholders. Importantly, these scenarios will give voice to the more marginalised members of local communities, such as women, who many not have livestock and have greater dependency on the harvesting of natural resources. The trade-off outcomes will be shared with local stakeholders and used to support decisions about how best to make use of the alternative rangeland management techniques to achieve the different land use scenarios they have identified.The proposal is unique in that it is the first attempt to use an integrated model of animal and plant production to explore trade-offs between different production scenarios in a communal grazing system in South Africa. If successful the approach has potential for extrapolation to many more communities throughout Eastern Cape and other communal grazing areas of South Africa through an existing 'Herding for Health' initiative that the proposal builds on.