Zambia to host the 8th General Assembly of the African MAB and Biosphere Reserves Network (AfriMAB)

There are preparations underway for Zambia to host the 8th General Assembly of the African MAB and Biosphere Reserves Network (AfriMAB) during the first half of 2025. This General Assembly will consolidate ongoing discussions and input from the Network in preparation for the 2025, 36th World Congress of Biosphere Reserves, at which the global Man and Biosphere Reserve Strategy and Action Plan will be deliberated.

The African MAB and Biosphere Reserves Network (AfriMAB) was last held in May 2023. At the 7th General Assembly of AfriMAB in Musanze, Rwanda, had participation from over 75 delegates drawn from more than 20 countries. The General Assembly was focused on the theme “Ecosystem Restoration in the Context of Sustainable Development: African Biosphere Reserves Leading the Way Towards 2030” and featured a series of detailed case studies of ecosystem restoration underway in African biosphere reserves.

For Zambia 15th of June 2022, was when the Kafue Flats Wetlands and surrounding area local leadership application was approved by UNESCO’s International Coordinating Council of the Man and Biosphere (ICC-MAB) Programme designating the Wetlands region as Zambia’s first Biosphere Reserve ie Kafue Flats Biosphere Reserve (KFBR) and opening our membership to the Network. Globally there are approximately 748 Biosphere Reserves, and the KFBR declaration was the first for Zambia. Notably, Zambia’s first project, based on the declaration called Facility for Action for Climate Empowerment to Achieve Nationally Determined Contributions (FACE-NDC), is German funded with implementation is led by the FAO.

Within the FACE-NDC project, UNESCO will implement a pilot component to demonstrate the value of the ‘Wet-land Watch’ approach for teachers' capacity building. Buntu Biosphere Reserve Foundation is a peer reviewer of the evaluation elements of this project in collaboration with Beehive Associates. The Buntu Foundation is on a separate front also in discussions with the Wildlife and Environment Conservation Society of Zambia to explore the use of their property in Itezhi-Tezhi for the development of a community-supported Biosphere Reserve Museum and Learning Centre at the west-end of the KFBR. Timestone Architects and BCHOD Quantity Surveyors have pledged probonal, only-cost-reimbursable-support once project development takes off. 

The objective of the MAB Programme is to identify and reinforce ways in which benefits from educational, scientific and cultural elements that contribute to the interdependence of local community livelihood and preserving their natural and cultural resources, may be strengthened. The Kafue Flats importance in this regard, lies in it being home to 20% of Zambia’s cattle, 20% of capture fishery, more than 20 cultural ceremonies, home to 100% of the World’s Kafue Lechwe and 25 % of the Worlds Wattled Crane, teaming with abundant wildlife, and contributing to the generation of 50 % of Zambia’s Hydro Electric Power and is also the largest sugar supplier nationally.

UNESCO’s Man and Biosphere Under Secretary’s Report for 2024 indicates that there were eleven new Biosphere Reserve sites in eleven different countries approved at the recently ended 2024 MAB – ICC in Paris joining the 748 World Network of Biosphere Reserves (WNBR) already existing sites, which, as of June 2024, were located in 134 countries and covering more than 7,400,000 square kilometers with over 275 million people across the whole world. Biosphere reserves make a major contribution to the Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD) with the target aimed at placing 30% of the Earth’s surface under conservation status by 2030.

Kafue Flats Biosphere Reserve Declaration

15 June 2024 Unesco HQ, Paris

Image© Cultival Tour operators

Reporting on Wetland Watch Support by FAO 1-5 July 2024

The View Hotel, Agadir, Morocco. Image©Trip.com