Community-based natural resource management

Investigations into the concept and practice of community-based natural resource management (CBNRM) are a key component of current research. CBNRM programmes are becoming widespread around the world, involving local people in planning and managing the natural resource base. However it is not clear to what extent CBNRM programmes are being shaped by local priorities and patterns of resource use, and there is a need to question the ways in which they are fulfilling implicit/explicit government agendas that may be antithetical to these aims.

My research in Botswana has been funded by the ESRC and RGS (HSBC grant), and I was recently currently Principal Investigator on a DFID funded research project in Namibia. The research in Namibia also involved capacity-building with researchers at the Multi-Disciplinary Research Centre at the University of Namibia.