Namibia for Life (N4L)
Namibia for Life (N4L) is the first Project Finance for Permanence (PFP) initiative for the developing world that is designed to secure long-term support to communal conservancies, focusing on ensuring sustainable social, economic and wildlife benefits of the conservancies for the health of the people and the planet.
Enduring Earth is a collaboration of partner organisations (The Nature Conservancy, The Pew Charitable Trusts, World Wildlife Fund, and ZOMALAB) which works alongside nations and communities to accelerate conservation worldwide, in order to help address the climate and biodiversity crises and support community economic development. Enduring Earth has already used the PFP approach to protect more than 120 million hectares in six different countries around the world. The aim of Enduring Earth is to establish 20 PFPs by 2030, and Namibia for Life is one of its prioritised PFP projects.
In Namibia’s rural communities, communal conservancies are engines that drive conservation and sustainable development. 86 established conservancies, covering more than 20% of the country, are home to critically endangered black rhino, desert-dwelling lions, elephants, and a host of other rare and endangered species of plants and animals, as well as 9% of Namibia’s human population. While the National CBNRM Programme has had great success, it is also a massive challenge to fund the continued protection and management of these areas.
PFP funding can help protect and conserve land under conservancy status by establishing exclusive wildlife zones, maintaining viable wildlife populations, expanding the value chain to spur economic growth in conservancies, improving general living conditions of conservancy members, managing human wildlife conflict, reducing poaching, and incorporating climate adaptation and resilience into plans and as a way of life. The intention of the PFPs is to secure funding for conservation in perpetuity in order to solve the challenges of accessing short-term donor funding.
The focus of N4L will be two-fold: to provide critical extension support services to communities and to secure funding to broaden nature-based socioeconomic development in conservancies.
In order to determine the needs in Namibia in the context of the prospective PFP and recommend the way forward, a feasibility study was conducted to guide the development process for N4L.
N4L was approved in March of 2022, with an engagement and planning phase to be undertaken until the end of 2024. The envisaged date for the start of funding is the beginning of 2025. In September 2022, the Namibia for Life PFP Extension Services Plan Development Workshop took place in Windhoek. The goal of this workshop was to determine the list of extensions services which will be covered under N4L. This was a comprehensive process, linked to the compliance requirements of the MEFT and with specific input from stakeholders through the NACSO thematic working groups (Institutional Development, Natural Resource Management and Business, Enterprise and Livelihoods).
The estimated funding need for the two components of N4L is USD 70 million; however, the next steps in the process are: 1) to develop a more specific financial and cost model based on the required extension services; and 2) to determine the exact funding mechanisms to be employed during project implementation.
The establishment of N4L will significantly change the funding landscape for community conservation in Namibia, ensuring that conservancies can continue the critical work of conserving wildlife, sustainably using their natural resources and improving the lives of their communities.
