An overwhelming majority of Phane harvesters are women and this is due to the fact that the majority of them has low levels of education and they heads large families.
As Phane is a major source of protain espeacilly for rural communities the project facilitator are plannig to colaborate with other researchers in the neighbouring countries and replicate what is being done in Botswana.
Planning non gef grant
As the study on Phane is likely to continue there is hope to consider other channels for funding.
Capacity - Building Component
Communities and harvesters in particular are going to benefit because they are going to learn suistanable methods of harvesting Phane. The information on Phane will be disseminated to different communities through kgotla meetings and during harvesting sites visits as the projects is carried out during the harvesting season were the majority of the people in rural areas will be mostly found. Some of the community members will have chance to attend policy seminars.
Notable Community Participation
Different communities participated during this study, as harvesters it was important that they become a major component of this project, they participated during kgotla meetings and during sampling.Qualitative data was collected using several techniques, including in-depth interviews with key informats such as buyers and harvesters.Kgotla meetings were held at all study sites were communities put forward their concerns in regard to the unsuistainable harvesting of Phane .
Policy Influence
Due to the important economic role this resource is serving to the rural communities, there has been talk of a "Phane legislation" to regulate its exploitation.Even though information on long term studies is not yet available; the data collected so far can go a long way in informing any policy formulation on th Phane resource. The recommendation based on the conclusions drawn have policy implications and can support resource use planning and management.
Emphasis on Sustainable Livelihoods
Good harvesting methods are principal in the preservation of Phane and for suistainable livelihoods.If Phane is harvestered suistainably and seeds are left it can multiply easly hence they can be a very very good harvest in the subsequent season. Through this project it has being noticed that there is a need for Phane harvesters to form groups so that they can be able to sell their harvest at an improved price unlike now wereby they are swindled by the middleman who go on to make a lot of money when they sell the Phane regionally and internationally.
Promoting Public Awareness of Global Environment
Increased community awareness on the importance of the different life stages of phane, proper harvesting levels, conservation and management will be carried out. The will also learn a lot during policy seminars and harvesters meetings and other relevant forums.
Policy Impact
Phane or Mophane worm is a major source of protein and income for the majority of rural people especially the unimployed therefore the reseacrh will influence the forethought policy on Community Based Natural Resources Management (CBNRM).This research builds up on the continuing efforts to collect and make available reliable information for sound policy development in the area of suistainable environmental and natural resource use, management and conservation, and improve on resource management skills.
Planning gef grant
The part completed thus far is seen as part one of what looks to be a long term study, therefore as phase two of the study begins, there is a plan to upscale the project to a medium sized GEF/SGP or even larger funding so that the study can address comprehensive emerging issues.
Linkages gef projects
The project has had some linkages with GEF supported AIACC project in Botswana.
Project Results
The objectives of this projects were largely met as the ecological studies of the resource phane was done.There was also the monitoring and evaluation of the spatial coverage of phane occurance using remote sensing techniques and the socio-economic issues relating to the harvesting, marketing and conservation of the resource was done.From the project result showed that phane habitat is comprised by the host mophane and other plant species for its different life stages and the dorminant pupae could be vulnarable to environmental factors such as land and other resources uses that could affect vegetaion cover and species composition of a site.
The egg laying and hatching has to synchronise with leafing and food availability for the larvae to avoid catastrophicpopulation loses as observed during the study and the synchrony is affected greatly by the phenology of the host mophane plant that is rainfall dependent.Harvesting is the last visible factor that impact on the maturing population before pupation, and if not managed carefully, it could have negative consequenes on the next crop. From the study it was observed that the vegetation structure at all study sites support habitat availability of the dorminant pupae resting stage in terms of species composition and lower strata.Heavily overgrazed areas invaded by specieswith hardly any crawling ground hugging lower brunches for litter trapping are likely to have unfavourable habitat conditions for pupae.Vegetation cutting especially due to arble activities are likely to affect the pupae stage.
The study revealed that an overwhelming majority of phane harvesters are women (89%) are women and most of them are household heads with big families(5-8) children, therefore phane is an important veld products to the harvesters and their communities because it has both a nutritional value (35.1%) and it is a source of seasonal income (26.1).Although the availability of of Phane depends on rain, it has observed by both the harvesters and their communities that its availability is decreasing.The primary harvesting method by local is that of finger lifting Phane from the trees and living the seeed or some Phane especialy that is on the tallest branches.It was learnt from Phane harvesters that some people are burning the Mophane tree in order to take phane in the tallest trees.
The market of Phane is locally, nationally and regionally. Harvesters showed that they get lowly paid when they sell localy but the prices tend to improve when one sells regionally. Lessons learned from the study included the fact that communities and harvesters in particular are willing and ready to protect all veld products in their area hence they need government intervetion if the pupae resource is to benefit them in a suistainable manner. For example they want the chiefs, headman to be authorized to manage and control the utilization of the resource, they also want a Phane pricing policy, and a Phane harvesters association. The participant benefited a lot from the project as the communities had a forum/opportunity for articulating their aspirations as regards their resource use, management and conservation and in the long term run they maybe a sound policy formulation, and possible resource management based on community aspirations.
