Richtersveld Cultural and Botanical Landscape World Heritage Site

[Kazimiera]

Richtersveld Cultural and Botanical Landscape World Heritage Site



The Richtersveld is one of the few areas in Southern Africa where transhumance pastoralism is still practised. As a cultural landscape it reflects long-standing and persistent traditions of the Nama, the indigenous community. Their seasonal pastoral grazing regimes, which sustain the extensive biodiversity of the area, were once much more widespread and are now vulnerable.

The dramatic, mountainous landscape of the Richtersveld in the Northern Cape is an awesome and sobering sight.

The 160 000ha area of dramatic mountainous desert in north-western South Africa is a cultural landscape communally owned and managed. The site sustains the semi-nomadic pastoral livelihood of the Nama people, reflecting seasonal patterns that may have persisted for as long as two millennia in Southern Africa. It is the only area where the Nama people still construct portable rush-mat houses (haru om) and migrate to new grazing grounds seasonally.

The Nama people collect medicinal and other plants and have a strong oral tradition associated with different places and attributes of the landscape. The succulent Karoo vegetation is preserved, demonstrating a harmonious interaction between people and nature.

Those who have had the good fortune to visit the Richtersveld find it hard to forget the rugged basalt mountains, scorching deserts, lichen-covered rocks, sun-baked lizards and diamond mines.

The Richtersveld Cultural and Botanical Landscape is buffered by the following protected areas: the Richtersveld National Park to the north; the Nababiep Provincial Nature Reserve to the east; and designated communal grazing areas to the south and west owned by the Sida !hub Community Property Association.


Source: http://www.gauteng.net/cradleofhuman...heritage_site/