Corridors
CapeNature manages two corridors – the Greater Cederberg Biodiversity Corridor and the Gouritz Corridor. These two corridors have been key drivers in forging a bond between conservation and agriculture.
Conservation corridors are stretches of land that link protected areas to ensure healthy, connected landscapes and habitats that support, and are supported by, local communities.
Through our work in these corridors, we mainstream biodiversity initiatives into agricultural and production sectors.
Greater Cederberg Biodiversity Corridor
The Greater Cederberg Biodiversity Corridor stretches across about 1.8 million hectares, from Niewoudtville in the north to Groot-Winterhoek in the south, Eland’s Bay in the west and the Tankwa Karoo National Park in the east.
Corridors act as passages for plants, animals, insects, birds to move from one region to the next. In light of climate change, they also play a vital role in allowing species to move from a warmer to a cooler region, and vice versa.
The Greater Cederberg Biodiversity Corridor is a partnership project between the Cape Action for People and the Environment programme and CapeNature. We aim to ensure that communities in the corridor live sustainably with, and benefit from, their natural resources both now and in the future.
The corridor helps land users improve the way they manage the economic, social and ecological aspects of their environment. We implement projects to expand protected areas in the region, improve well-being in local communities, develop local economies, raise awareness and get industry involved, and coordinate various structures. To find out more, click here.Gouritz Corridor
The Gouritz Corridor is home to fynbos, forest, and succulent Karoo, thicket and Nama-Karoo vegetation. It falls under the Succulent Karoo Ecosystem Programme and the Cape Action for People and the Environment programme.
The corridor stretches from the Great Karoo to the sea, using the Gouritz River and its tributaries as its backbone. It is an area rich in biodiversity, with a fascinating geological and fossil history.
By the year 2020, we aim to ensure that the Gouritz Corridor supports a system of sustainable living landscapes that represents the region's biodiversity.The corridor is made up of partnerships between existing nature reserves and private landowners who are encouraged to adopt conservation-conscious farming methods and, where possible, to set aside portions of land to be conserved.
We work to establish partnerships with local communities to develop tourist routes, eradicate alien plants, conduct leopard research projects and developing industry standards for the ostrich industry.
To find out more, visit http://www.gouritz.com