Wildlife Tourism and Resilient Community Livelihoods: A Transfrontier Conservation Area Perspective

This study examines the resilience of community livelihoods in a multi-country case study encompassing Botswana, Zimbabwe, and Zambia. Data from in-depth interviews and focus group discussions with tourism and conservation stakeholders reveal that community vulnerability in these regions stems from reliance on tourism and natural resources, political dynamics in wildlife tourism and conservation, and climate change impacts. The study suggest that the adaptive strategies, such as product diversification and indigenous knowledge integration, are crucial to mitigating vulnerabilities in wildlife destinations. However, the disparities observed in institutional support, policy implementation, and national governance frameworks contribute to certain meta-governance failures within some communities in the Kavango-Zambezi Transfrontier Conservation Area (KAZA), affecting the effectiveness of adaptive strategies and the resilience of community livelihoods. Therefore, a comprehensive integration of decentralised approaches within the meta-governance structure of Transfrontier Conservation Areas (TFCAs) could enhance the resilience of community livelihoods and bolster conservation efforts.