Mosi-oa-Tunya / Victoria Falls

Project to construct a dam across the gorge (issue resolved)

• The report is of a high technical quality and has fully recognised and considered the recommendations from the “Strategic Environmental Assessment of Developments Around Victoria Falls”, prepared and published by IUCN, in 1996
• The main problem still remains to be the fact that this development is proposed within the boundaries of the World Heritage site. However, as observed in the report, the area proposed for development has been already affected by existing hotel infrastructure and the new development will not cause any further degradation of the site but in fact may contribute to rehabilitating and improving the scenic qualities of the area.
• The report fully recognises a series of potential environmental and social impacts, most of them in line with previous reports prepared by IUCN on this site, but has not suggested clear ways and means to solve or mitigate them.
• Since the proposed development is extensive, Livingstone based authorities may not have the capacity to deal with issues such as security, health problems, sewage disposal, etc. The Central Government of Zambia must intervene to solve these problems. However, no information has been received from the Zambian Government on how it intends to respond to these issues.
• Stakeholders involved in this development proposal stressed the economic importance of this project for Zambia and have expressed the wish that the project is executed as soon as possible.

• The location of the proposed development is within the boundaries of the site and particularly close to the banks of the rivers.
• Institutional support that should be provided by the Zambian Government to address environmental problems is not defined;
• Given that the site belongs to two States Parties, the Government of Zambia needs to discuss the project with the Government of Zimbabwe, to seek the latter’s agreement on implementation policies, procedures and schedules. 

The Bureau was informed that IUCN had reviewed the “Scoping Report: Potential impacts associated with the proposed development of the Mosi-Oa-Tunya Hotel Complex”, prepared by the Division of Water, Environment and Forestry Technology, CSIR, South Africa. This report was commissioned by Sun International, the company that would like to develop this hotel complex on the Zambian side of this trans-border World Heritage site.

From IUCN’s point of view, the key issues of concern are that:
(a) the location of the proposed development is within the boundaries of the site and particularly close to the banks of the rivers;
(b) institutional support that should be provided by the Zambian Government to address environmental problems is not defined;
(c) given that the site belongs to two States Parties, the Government of Zambia needs to discuss the project with the Government of Zimbabwe, to seek the latter’s agreement on implementation policies, procedures and schedules.

The response of the Zimbabwean Department of National Parks and Wildlife Management (ZDNPWLM) to the hotel development proposal of Sun International has been transmitted to the Centre, on 25 September 1998, by the Zimbabwe National Commission for UNESCO, ZDNPWLM has emphasised the need to preserve the World Heritage site as a global asset and stressed that any development proposal should be subject to EIA procedures that invite full public involvement. ZDNPWLM has pointed out that it lacks details and information on the hotel development proposal. Hence, ZDNPWLM is unable to make specific and constructive comments or endorse the development proposal.

The Bureau requested the Centre to co-operate with the IUCN Regional Office for Southern Africa to organize a bi-national meeting to bring representatives the Governments of Zambia and Zimbabwe together. The meeting should be designed and organized in a manner so as to clarify issues concerning this development project in accordance with the joint responsibility of the two States Parties to conserve and properly manage this trans-border World Heritage property. The Bureau also supported the ZDNPWLM’s position to emphasise the need to preserve the World Heritage site as a global asset and that any development proposal should be subject to EIA procedures with full public involvement.