|
|
|
|
Grasslands
- Who Needs Them? Grasslands
are boring, treeless wastelands that once maintained large forests until Man arrived on
the scene and chopped out or bunt down all the trees right?
Most of South Africa’s coal deposits are found in the grasslands and
this is proof positive that there were forests here right? We are doing everybody a huge
favour by planting the largest manmade forests on earth in these wastelands right? Wrong
on all counts! Grasslands
are thought to be one of the most ancient vegetation types in the world. African grasslands once covered as much as 60% of
the continent. Climatic and other factors
probably kept the forests restricted to the warmer, wetter low-lying parts of the world
until around three million years ago. Around
that time there was a general warming of the climate and the “savannas” (a
mixture of trees and grassland in contrast to the original meaning of the word) of today
began to develop. Until that time Man (or his
predecessors), not being a ruminant and thus being unable to live off grasses alone, was
probably restricted to the fruit-bearing forest areas.
These savannas developed until they had covered most of the grassland areas
except those where altitude meant that the climate was too cold for tropical or
subtropical trees. Now the African grasslands
are all but restricted to the high lying areas of South Africa. Only a few small pockets remain elsewhere on the
continent. Many
people associate coal with prehistoric forests. In
many cases this may well be true. South
Africa’s coal deposits, however, are the result of the presence of a tundra-like
vegetation that covered the countryside some 200 million or more years ago. Fossil plants found in the coal-rich areas of the
country are largely of fern-like plants with little or no evidence of trees. There is much evidence of large scale lightning
caused fires raging over most of Africa as long ago as the Palaeozoic - some 300 million
years ago. Forest trees are notoriously
susceptible to fire so this provides yet another indication that trees were restricted in
their distribution in Africa at least. Far
from being boring grasslands support an amazingly high diversity of species, many of them
endemic to the area, i.e. occurring or breeding nowhere else on Earth. Botanically they support up to 81 species per 1
000 m2 - this compares to 86 species in the renosterveld of the West Coast and
65 species in the fynbos. These include spectacularly beautiful species such as watsonias,
gladioluses, orchids, red hot pokers (even if the Rand Water Board would have you believe
that these are extinct in the wild), arum lilies, aloes, etc. Birdwise 40-odd species are endemic to South
Africa, Lesotho and Swaziland. Of these 12 are endemic to our grasslands. Economically
natural grasslands make a major contribution to South Africa’s GDP. The
runoff from the grassland catchments around Wakkerstroom, in south-eastern
Mpumalanga,
alone supply water to Eskom’s Highveld Power Stations and the SASOL plant at Secunda
with a tap value in Johannesburg of more than R 625 million each year. These power stations provide 70% of South Africa’s
electricity requirements. Without this water
all the coal in the world would not be able to provide these requirements and South Africa’s
economy would sink into oblivion. Water from
the alpine grasslands of Lesotho is likely to far exceed this value to the South Africa
Economy. The
grasslands of south-eastern Mpumalanga also provide free grazing for more than 1,5 million
sheep. The meat value of these sheep at a
Johannesburg butcher is more than R 487 million. The
same sheep provide their owners with an annual wool cheque well in excess of R 50 million. The
value of grassland species used by traditional healers has not been properly assessed, but
is likely to run to at least another R 50 million annually. Tourism
earned South Africa somewhere around R 7 500 million in 1996 and it is the fastest growing
industry in the country, indeed in the world. While
not all of this money was generated by eco-tourism Satour’s research does show that
by far the majority of tourists were attracted to this country’s natural assets. At an eco-tourism conference at Midrand in 1997
Dr Hector Ceballos-Lascurain, special advisor to the IUCN (International Union for the
Conservation of Nature) maintained that bird watching is by far the biggest sector of the world
eco-tourism market. There were between 40 and
50 million bird watchers in the United States and Canada alone and around 28 million of
these spend at least a week away from home each year.
Most of these are eager to increase their world lifelists and are keen
travellers to areas with a high number of endemic species. South
Africa’s tourist industry has generally not yet latched onto the value of birding and
birders on a global scale, but this is set to change rapidly in the near future. With ten endemic species South Africa’s
remaining natural grasslands are bound to get a large slice of this tourism pie and thus
contribute even further to the country’s GDP - provided that these grasslands survive
our onslaught against them. In
spite of their great value to South Africa, both economically and ecologically, the fact
of the matter is that: · between
60 and 80% of South Africa’s grasslands have been irreversibly transformed and are
not capable of being restored; · less
than 2% of South Africa’s grasslands are formally conserved; · of
the 115 859 kmē of grasslands in the erstwhile Transvaal - * 56
782 kmē were under cultivation by 1987; * more
than 7 000 kmē were under plantations by the early 1990s and a further 5 000 kmē are
scheduled for tree planting by 2020; * South
Africa’s major metropolitan area - the Province of Gauteng with an area of 30 336
kmē and 8,791 million inhabitants - lies almost completely within the area; * 2
000 kmē of the Mpumalanga Highveld is taken up by South Africa’s major gold and coal
deposits, much of which are mined in opencast pits. · Pollution
levels on the Mpumalanga Highveld area among
the highest in the world largely as a result of: * 8
Eskom Power Stations producing 70% of South
Africa’s power requirements with no controls imposed on their gaseous emissions; * 6
pulp and paper mills (a further 8 have been proposed in the grasslands as a whole); * 2
petrol-from-coal plants; * many
large industries with a high potential for causing major pollution disasters (e.g. a
multitude of steel, gold chrome and other metallurgical processing industries). This
sorry state of affairs is reflected in the degree of threat to our grassland birds. Of the twelve bird species endemic to our
grasslands four - Rudd’s and Botha’s Larks, Southern Bald Ibis and
Yellowbreasted Pipit, are considered to be globally threatened by BirdLife International
and another five - Blue Korhaan, Mountain Pipit, Orangebreasted Rockjumper, Buffstreaked
Chat and Drakensberg Siskin are considered to be Near Threatened, i.e. they have a good
chance of becoming threatened. Only Sentinel
Rock Thrush, Drakensberg Prinia, Eastern Longbilled Lark (the last two species of disputed
validity) remain unthreatened. In addition
Rudd’s Lark is the only species classified as Critically Threatened in South Africa,
making it the county’s most threatened bird. A
glance at the Southern African Bird Atlas seems to confirm this. Its distribution appears to have become
dangerously fragmented with some 85% of the remaining world population being centred
around Wakkerstroom. Fragmentation of our
grasslands into isolated pockets or islands will reduce the viability of these and other
grassland specialists even further. Do we
really want to be held accountable for their demise? In
order to save at least some of our remaining grasslands the Wakkerstroom Natural Heritage
Association initiated the GRASS Workshop. The
main impetus of GRASS is to establish a million hectare internationally recognised
Grassland Biosphere Reserve centred on Wakkerstroom, including parts of Mpumalanga,
KwaZulu-Natal and the Free State, within the foreseeable future. The Biosphere Reserve Programme was established
under the auspices of UNESCO (United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural
Organisation) to ensure that Man was brought into the conservation equation. By 1996 there were 329 internationally recognised
Biosphere Reserves in 83 countries (none in South Africa) covering more than 218 million
hectares throughout the world. Essentially
farms within the target area will remain farms. Landowners
and other members of the communities living within the biosphere target area will be
encouraged to participate in the Biosphere Reserve on a strictly voluntary basis. The project is enthusiastically supported by the
Mpumalanga Parks Board. KwaZulu-Natal Conservation Services, Free State Nature
Conservation and various Central Government Departments operating in the area. Should
you wish to know more about this exciting project or how to join the Wakkerstroom Natural
Heritage Association please contact John McAllister on (017) 730-0269 or Elna
Kotze on (017) 730-0029 or better still come to Wakkerstroom in person. John
McAllister P O Box 249, Wakkerstroom, 2480.
|
|
