Challenges for catchment management agencies: Lessons from bureaucracies, business and resource management

Abstract

Catchment management agencies (CMAs) have no tested precedent in South Africa and will have to evolve in complex and changing business, social and natural environments as they strive to ensure that equity and social justice are achieved within ecological limits. Traditionally, very different styles of management have been used for resource exploitation and resource protection and this will present a serious dilemma for CMAs. As the human population has grown and natural resources have declined, there has been increased effort to control nature in order to harvest its products and reduce its threats. Initially such “command-and-control” management has been successful as agencies prosper on short-term gains. However, when natural variation is reduced the ecosystem loses its resilience and ability to “bounce back” from disturbances. The first lesson we can learn is that the longer term consequence of command-and-control management is always either a reduction or cessation of resource supply. The second lesson comes from adaptive resource management (ARM).

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