Conservation
Why Community Matters
'ways that the community can directly benefit from the presence of tourism'
Vamizi Island lies in the region of the Mwani people, meaning "people of the coast". Fishing, small scale agriculture and animal husbandry have always been the economic background of the Mwani. Their religious traditions, and their moral values are based upon these and by showing sustainable methods to improve these activities alongside the development of new income generating alternatives it is mutually benefical for conservation, tourism and the quality of life of the Vamizi Island community.
The Vamizi Island project has recently finished building a clinic and a school on Vamizi for the local families ensuring better education and health care for the local community. Education is key to the prosperous development of Vamizi's Island community and a range of educational programes have been put in place, including environmental programmes for staff and school children to achieve this.
Local supply groups have been formed to help source regional products and to ensure that any future investment stays on the island which helps further development. There is also a strict company policy of employing, where possible, people from Vamizi or neighbouring coastal villages.
A Women's Association formed in 2005 is involved in a number of projects: from handicrafts, dancing, theatre, tourism, agriculture and the supply of regional produce for the Lodge.
With the help of Vamizi's resident community officer a longterm strategy has been put in place allowing the community to make decisions and actively participate through a selected local committee of community shareholders, elected and approved in accordance with local Mozambican government. Key subjects that are addressed are the preservation of Water, Health, Education and Natural Resources. These meetings will be supervised by the resident community officer to ensure best practices are maintained.
Such ventures and others like them can help island conservation in two ways, by providing alternative incomes and reducing the pressures on fishing, and by enforcing a critical train of logic – that if the island is well preserved and properly managed, tourists will come, bringing wealth and new opportunity to a community.
Vamizi Island is much more than vacation Nirvana for the privileged few – it is also a home and a community for the 1,000 people who live in three villages on the eastern tip of the island.
Historically a place of retreat, Vamizi Island began to be settled by people trying to avoid the ravages of the Mozambique civil war, which ended over a decade ago.
Life in the villages is basic and remarkably traditional. Most people survive by trading fish, caught from dugout canoes, small local sailboats (dhows)or picked off by hand from the island's reefs. There has never been fresh water on the island, so every drop the community uses is brought in by sailboats to the thatched villages twice a day from the mainland.
What may seem in some ways romantic or unspoilt is, in its mirror image, a tough life, beggared by scarce resources and little opportunity. The grand plan now is to help these villages beat poverty and improve daily life, to develop decent medical and school facilities, create new options and conserve this island home and its bountiful ocean riches, for the good of the community, their children and their children's children.