“Well over 10% of the South African landscape is severely affected by either the prevalence of invasive alien plants (IAPs) or encroachment of indigenous species onto grasslands or savanna landscapes and in the face of accelerated climate change, they pose an increasingly threatening prospect in terms of water security, exposure to wildfire disasters and loss of biodiversity,” says Cobus Meiring of the Southern Cape Landowners Initiative (SCLI).
According to Meiring. the South African government, mandated and delegated entities, land managers and landowners simply lack the resources to effectively control and eradicate IAPs and bush encroachment. The expansion of areas affected and the rate that the problem plants spread are of huge concern.
At the same time, many South Africans have been and are making a living from the biomass generated by the harvesting of both IAP and bush encroachment species, and this economic activity has now aptly been coined the “biomass economy”.
“In the face of a global economic downturn, as well as extreme levels of unemployment in South Africa, using IAP and encroachment biomass as a resource makes sense at various levels. A healthy biomass economy can make a significant difference in the South African effort to contain, mitigate and control the negative impact of invasive alien plant and bush encroachment species, and at the same time assist the country towards creating a green economy and energy diversification,” says Meiring.
A study titled, “The development of a strategic framework for the development of an alien and invasive biomass economy in South Africa” is currently underway to get a better sense of exactly how big the biomass economy is, what the economic prospects of it is and who the entities are that drive the biomass economy in South Africa.
Photo: Invasive and alien plant biomass: A healthy biomass economy can make a significant difference in the South African effort to contain, mitigate and control the negative impact of invasive alien plant and bush encroachment species, and at the same time assist the country towards creating a green economy. (Photo: SCLI)