ORYX VOL 30 NO 2 APRIL 1996 Conservation and sustainable resource use in the Hadejia-Jama'are Valley, Nigeria William M. Adams and David H. L. Thomas Sustainable development is increasingly being seen as a legitimate, and locally critical, element in wildlife conservation. However, relatively few studies of projects attempt to combine conservation and development goals. The Hadejia-Nguru Wetland Conservation Project in Nigeria grew out of a concern for wildlife (particularly wetland birds), but has expanded to address issues of environmental sustainability and economic development at both the local and the regional scale. This paper assesses the achievements of the project's approach. Conservation and sustainable people are likely to oppose the establishment development of parks unless 'strenuous and imaginative ef- forts are made from the start to involve them Eltringham (1994) asked 'Can wildlife pay its in planning and development of the park', way?' and by posing that question he marked and to see that they benefit from any employ- a major shift in the way in which we under- ment generated (p. 725). The creation of new stand and conceive of conservation. During economic opportunities in a buffer zone the last decade, ideas about wildlife conser- around a national park may take human vation based on the designation of protected pressure off the national park itself. areas have increasingly given way to attempts Development here is being used as a means of to integrate human needs and conservation winning over local opposition to conservation objectives at the local scale and particularly to objectives, the carrot that balances the more a new focus on people and parks (McNeely conventional sticks, such as antipoaching and and Miller, 1984; Brandon and Wells, 1992; land-use control measures. Wells and Brandon, 1992). These new ideas Changes in international conservation have grown from increasing concern about the thinking about protected-area policy in recent failings of conventional exclusionist ap- decades have been deeply influenced by proaches to conservation, particularly in wider debates about sustainable development Africa, and recognition by conservationists of (Adams, 1990). This notion of sustainable de- the validity of developmental claims by poor velopment has become the chief means by rural communities (e.g. Adams and McShane, which conservationists have sought to theor- 1992). The patterns of 'fortress' conservation ize a new relationship between local develop- are no longer seen to be wholly acceptable, or ment and wildlife conservation. The idea that effective. In recent years there has been in- there was some form of development that is creased awareness both of the problems that 'sustainable', in the sense that it maximized can be caused to local people by the establish- human welfare while avoiding environmental ment of protected areas and the impossibility costs, emerged at the 1972 United Nations of achieving conservation objectives without Conference on the Human Environment in addressing socio-economic needs. Stockholm, and was in due course the central New approaches to protected areas include concept in the World Conservation Strategy the notion of zonation and buffer zones, for (WCS; IUCN, WWF and UNEP, 1980), in the example in Biosphere Reserves (Batisse, 1982). report of the World Commission on However, Blower (1984) commented that local Environment and Development (Brundtland, ©1996FFI 131 Downloaded from https://www.cambridge.org/core. IP address: 170.106.33.19, on 29 Sep 2021 at 19:41:03, subject to the Cambridge Core terms of use, available at https://www.cambridge.org/core/terms. https://doi.org/10.1017/S0030605300021517 W. M. ADAMS AND D. H. L. THOMAS 1987), in the WCS's successor, Caring for the Conservation in the Hadejia-Nguru Earth (IUCN, 1991), and at the UN Conference Wetlands, Nigeria on Environment and Development in Rio in 1992. Sustainable development has become a The Hadejia and Jama'are rivers drain north- common phrase on the lips of politicians, de- eastwards through Kano, Bauchi, Jigawa, velopment bureaucrats and commentators Yobe and Borno States in north-east Nigeria. (Redclift, 1987; Adams, 1990). The promotion They join near the town of Hadejia before of sustainable development formed one of moving on to flow into Lake Chad as the IUCN's seven programme areas for the period Komadugu Yobe. Between Hadejia and 1985-87. The original plan to revise the WCS Gashua, some 100 km downstream, the rivers every 3 years gave way to progressive adap- flow through an extensive area of low sand tation as national conservation strategies were dunes, between 10 and 30 m in height, and produced under IUCN guidance (McCormick, several km in length (Figures 1 and 2). These 1989). A major revision was discussed at the cause a confused drainage pattern and a range IUCN General Assembly in Perth in 1990. of wetland environments, including season- Conservation is increasingly being seen in ally and permanently flooded land mixed terms of its role in sustainable development, with dry farmland, has developed that has and development (particularly meeting the been labelled the Hadejia-Nguru Wetlands needs of local people) is now widely seen as a (Figure 1). The rainfall of the Hadejia- necessary condition of effective conservation. Jama'are basin ranges from 1300 mm per year None the less, there are relatively few case in the south-west to under 500 mm in the north-east studies of attempts to combine conservation at Gashua. Annual rainfall is variable, with and sustainable development. This paper of- poor rains between 1972 and 1978 and be- fers such a case study. It discusses the practi- tween 1980 and 1987 (Hollis et al., 1993a). cal experience of the Hadejia-Nguru Wetlands Rainfall is concentrated in a single wet season Conservation Project (HNWCP) in northern (c. May-September), and river flow is highly Nigeria, which has tried to implement some of seasonal. Almost 80 per cent of total runoff in these new ideas about the integration of con- the Hadejia and Jama'are occurs in August servation objectives and the needs of local and September. The human population of the communities, using the concepts and frame- floodplain is large (up to 1 million people), work of sustainable development. Both with Hausa, Bedde, Fulani and Kanuri com- authors have been involved with the HNWCP munities. There is a sizeable economy based since 1987, in different capacities and to differ- on rainy season and dry season agriculture, ent degrees, and in describing the problems fishing and grazing (Barbier et al, 1991). the project has faced we are describing to a The rich wildlife of the Hadejia-Nguru large extent the limitations of our own in- Wetlands has long been recognized. sights and understanding*. Our comments are Anecdotal reports by wildfowlers were con- therefore explicitly self-critical, and intended firmed in the 1970s (Elgood, 1977), and a more to be constructive. detailed study demonstrated the national and international importance of the area for Palaearctic and Afrotropical birds (Ash and Sharland, 1986). The area is part of a system of * W.M.A. has carried out research in the wetlands in the Sahel that provides important Hadejia-Jama'are floodplain since 1987 and worked passage and wintering grounds for substantial with the HNWCP for short periods on various numbers of Palaearctic migrant birds, particu- occasions. D.H.L.T. was employed by IUCN as larly waterfowl, as well as important habitat technical consultant to the HNWCP between 1989 for Afrotropical species (Stowe and Coulthard, and 1992 and has conducted research in the area 1990). The area is internationally important for since that time. The views expressed here are the authors' own and do not represent those of any the ferruginous duck Aythya nyroca, support- organization. ing over 1 per cent of the Western Palaearctic 132 © 1996 FFI, Oryx, 30 (2), 131-142 Downloaded from https://www.cambridge.org/core. IP address: 170.106.33.19, on 29 Sep 2021 at 19:41:03, subject to the Cambridge Core terms of use, available at https://www.cambridge.org/core/terms. https://doi.org/10.1017/S0030605300021517 CONSERVATION AND RESOURCE USE, HADEJIA-JAMA'ARE VALLEY, NIGERIA — National boundary — State boundary Hadejia-Jama 'are floodplain 0 km 100 I | Figure 1. Location of the 0 km 200 Hadejia-Jama'are Wetlands. population, and has over 20,000 wintering resource use could be allowed to evolve over waterfowl with significant numbers of com- time in response to environmental, demo- mon shoveler Anas clypeata and comb duck graphic and socio-economic change. Sarkidiornis melanotos in particular (Perennou, In a second protected-area initiative, the 1991). Borno State Government declared a bird sanc- The wildlife importance of the wetlands has tuary in a deeply flooded oxbow lake at the led to several attempts to establish conven- village of Dagonna in 1989 (Figure 2). This tional protected areas, but they have not been lake holds water late into the dry season, and very successful. A bird sanctuary was demar- is an important site for birds, particularly cated in the wetlands by the Kano State comb ducks. The bird sanctuary was inaug- Wildlife Department in 1977, and the Baturiya urated in February 1989 on the occasion of a Wetland Reserve was gazetted in 1985. Seven visit by the President of the World Wide Fund villages were moved out of the area, and one for Nature, but there is now little to show of remains. In order to complete gazettement, the the sanctuary. Game guards were appointed reserve was officially made a 'multiple use re- by the Borno State Ministry, but were not paid serve'. All existing usage rights were ex- regularly or adequately equipped so there has tinguished with the aim of re-establishing been little incentive to do the unpopular job of them at some future date under license.