Peace parks in Africa---------------Egypt?

[UGHAZA...@hotmail.com]

-------------Groupe Moderator Comment
I think Gabel Elba Protected Area it is ideal to established as peace
park between Egypt and Sudan to give opportunity for more conservation
effort and also to give use opportunity to visit and enjoy with this
fantastic nature. Read this article as case study for our future.

Usama ghazaly

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Main Article Editorial

Not so long ago it still seemed a wild dream when conservationists
talked about a southern African network of parks bound together through
the removal of national boundaries separating adjoining reserves and
through the creation of corridors to link those further apart.

It seemed even more fanciful to talk about animals being able to resume
old migratory routes stretching thousands of kilometres, or of tourists
travelling through a practically non-stop African wilderness as they
traverse several countries on one excursion.

Now it is not far-fetched any more. In fact, it has been lent wonderful
meaning by this week's intergovernmental agreement aimed at creating a
transfrontier conservation area encompassing and to a large extent
linking reserves in Botswana, Namibia, Angola, Zambia and Zimbabwe.

The attributes of the so-called Kavango-Zambezi scheme are
breathtaking. With several transfrontier parks already in operation in
southern Africa, this one is by far the most ambitious.

It will cover an area about the size of Italy; it will include the
fabulous Okavango swamps and the Victoria Falls; and it will open to
tourists a vast tapestry of about every habitat Africa has to offer and
a spectacular array of wildlife.

There is the human wonder, too. Bear in mind that most of this area was
the arena for some of Africa's most brutal cross-border and civil wars
and that it is barely five years ago that Jonas Savimbi's killing
brought an end to Angola's catastrophic |conflict.

Naturally, there are reservations. Some of the reserves talked about
are no more than "paper parks", existing in name only.

To lend substance to the scheme, each of the countries involved will
have to improve its own parks management. And to put it all together is
going to require extraordinary commitment from them all.

But this detracts nothing from the ideal itself. There are formidable
security issues at stake, and there are many other problems, not least
the landmines littering particularly the Angolan part of the proposed
conservation area.

But how much better to strive for peace and for protecting nature
rather than planning for war and destruction.

How appropriate to call these peace parks.

December 14, 2006 Edition 1
http://www.capetimes.co.za/index.php?fArticleId=3592351