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People and Conservation

Imbewu

Wise elders share stories, experiences and enthusiasm in this unique 4-day wilderness camping programme for South African youth leaders. They plant a seed – ‘imbewu’ in Zulu and Xhosa – of passion for African nature and culture. Using their oral tradition and indigenous knowledge the elders lead walking trails and interpret the natural environment. After sunset they tell folk stories around the camp fire.

Imbewu is a joint project of SANParks and the Wilderness Foundation. It was created in 1996 in the Kruger National Park. Since then camps have been established in the national parks of Addo Elephant, Tsitsikamma and Namaqua as well as in Imfolozi Game Reserve (KZN Wildlife). In 2007 the programme will expand to Marakele, Golden Gate and Kgalagadi. Special women’s Imbewus are planned in August 2007.

So far the programme has taken over 6 000 historically disadvantaged youth leaders to the experiential bush camps. Each Imbewu course is made up of eight participants and two guides; Kruger takes the double amount of people. The participants sleep out in the bush, under tree in an open sky. In cases where there are dangerous animals, an electric fence is made for participants to stay and sleep inside. All participants are aged between 15-24 years old with an equal number of young men and women. Imbewu works with local AIDS community-based organizations and have taken a number of counsellors and youth that are HIV positive on the courses.

Throughout the years Imbewu has trained 22 wise elders as teachers. They were drawn from a small circle of retired black game rangers, many of whom cannot read or write. They share wisdom from lifelong work in the parks and from traditions learnt from their forefathers. Almost every traditional cultural group in South Africa is represented through these elders – all the teaching and interpretation takes place in home languages. The average age of the guides is 66 years and they each have at least 30 years work experience in the park or game reserve in which the course takes place. Currently most of the elders are men but there are three woman elders in the programme.