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Although the financial returns of game ranching in South Africa have been well documented, it is often implicitly assumed that the increased transition of lands to game ranching equates to net conservation gains in terms of habitat management and biodiversity conservation. As a first step towards testing this assumption, we conducted qualitative interviews with 28 game ranchers and 10 other key stakeholders in South Africa to investigate how ranchers manage habitat on their lands, and the degree to which they incorporate ecological advice into their land management activities. The purpose of this analysis was to elicit the range of views on how game ranching contributes to biodiversity conservation, rather than to measure the distribution of ranchers who engage in specific stewardship practices. We found that interviewed game ranchers engage in several stewardship practices that are consistent with sustainable use, namely: control of bush encroachment; removal of invasive, exotic plants; erosion control; the use of fire; and active management of game to maintain habitat quality. However, these land stewardship practices were not uniformly adopted by interviewed ranchers, and were not always based on ecological advice. Although our results cannot be expanded to the larger game ranching community in South Africa, they do suggest that game ranchers would benefit from active extension services that provide guidance on biologically sustainable land management practices, which would reinforce the long-term financial and ecological viability of game ranches.

The core of South Africa tourism industry is based on wildlife tourism. Private game reserves and game farms which forms part of wildlife tourism constitute most of the wildlife products in South Africa. On these private reserves and game farms, hunting is one of the major income generators for product owners. The aim of this study is to analyse the economic impact of hunting on the regional economies of three of South Africa’s most important hunting provinces. The study used economic multipliers, input-output analysis, and related modelling processes through input-output (supply-use) tables and social accounting matrices (SAM). The results differed significantly for the three provinces, with Limpopo receiving the biggest impact (R2.6 billion) and the Free State having the highest multiplier (2.08). The geographical location of the game farms, the number of farms per province and the species available all influenced the magnitude of the economic impact of hunters over and above the traditional determinants of economic impact analysis. The implication of the research is that it will help product owners in the development of game farms or hunting products, contribute to policy formulation, especially for government decisions on what products to offer where, and how to create more jobs.

Most of South Africa’s national parks are based in rural areas, although a few parks – such as Wilderness National Park (WNP) – are situated in an urban area. This park differs from other national parks in several ways: it is not fenced in, it has very few animal species and it is a marine (fresh and salt water) reserve. WNP is a scenic park with wetlands, beaches and forests. It is well known that national parks are not developed and managed for their environmental purposes alone but they also have an economic and social obligation to surrounding communities. The aim of this article is therefore to determine the socio‐economic impact of WNP. In order to achieve this aim, the research involved three surveys, namely a business survey, a community survey and an overnight park tourists survey. The results indicated that the park has an impact in terms of production, income generation and employment and it is also achieving its goal with regard to conservation, creating economic opportunities and involving th...