The WWF-Mondi Wetlands Programme demonstrates how water stewardship and good business practices go hand-in-hand and, in the process, contributes to developing global best practices for wetland management.
Since the turn of the 20th century, around half of our planet’s wetlands have been destroyed, and it is estimated that South Africa has already lost a similar amount of wetlands in line with this global trend. At the same time, water stress in this country is fast reaching a critical point and it is likely, if current trends continue, that demand will exceed supply by 2025.
However, wetlands play a vital role in the environment and society, and in the sustainable provision of water for both. They support people through activities including farming, fishing, tourism and water provision.
They host a rich biodiversity, protect coastlines and act as natural sponges that store water, releasing it slowly over time so as to prevent flooding and to provide water in the dry seasons.
Despite providing these ecological goods and services to society, wetlands have been incorrectly viewed as insect-ridden swamplands that are best drained and developed in some areas.
Recognising the critical importance of wetlands and the problems facing wetland conservation, 25 years ago, South Africa’s two largest conservation organisations, the World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF) and the Wildlife and Environment Society of South Africa (WESSA) established the Rennies Wetlands Project in South Africa. In 2001, Mondi became the principal sponsor, and the project was renamed the WWF-Mondi Wetlands Programme (MWP).
Establishing national best practice
“The key to this partnership has really been the trust, transparency and respect it has created,” says David Lindley, manager of the WWF-MWP. “With supporting science, it has allowed us to develop new practices to improve wetland health and has led to the establishment of a national wetland community of practice. Mondi’s support and core funding has provided continuity and been fundamental to this achievement.”
One of the key programme breakthroughs, backed by leading scientists, was to develop a practical way of defining exactly where the wetlands boundaries end. This led to the adoption of government rules stipulating how land users and regulators were to delineate and respect wetlands.
It also uncovered the critical role that wetlands play in overall water resources and was able to define practical solutions to protect and restore wetlands. It provided the impetus for the establishment of the National Working for Wetlands Programme in 2000, and the Wetland Community Practice. The WWF-MWP’s approach and methodologies contributed to best practice in South Africa and were shared with the rest of the world through WWF’s global network.
For a large part of its 25-year existence, the programme focused on managing and rehabilitating wetlands with various land- user groups, as the responsibility needed to be shared with all involved. As a result, Mondi has improved wetland management on forestry land while removing commercial trees from riparian zones and wetlands. Another benefit was the development of an understanding of how fresh water ecosystems are linked from the top to the bottom of a catchment, and how we can protect and even improve them.
Catalysing water stewardship through a new landscape approach
In 2014, WWF-MWP broadened its focus from wetlands to water stewardship using a new landscape approach. Stewardship is about taking care of something we do not own, such as the natural shared resource of water. Therefore, good water stewards understand their own water use, catchment context and shared risk in terms of water governance, water balance, water quality and important water-related areas, and then engage in meaningful individual and collective actions that benefit people and nature. The innovative landscape approach focuses on an entire landscape or catchment rather than an individual landowner or a specific land use or sector, such as the sugar or the plantation forestry industry, and on aligning them to shared objectives on water stewardship using specific tools.
Since 2014, the programme has focused on the water-stressed uMngeni and uMvoti River catchments, both of which are strategically important water supply areas for KwaZulu-Natal’s economic hubs and home to some five million people. Stakeholders from the plantation forestry, dairy, sugar and pig farming sectors are also involved. Next year, the programme will expand to the water-stressed uMhlathuze catchment at Richards Bay.
A key success factor of this approach is in connecting individual risk to shared risk, and ultimately spearheading shared action and creating shared value from these landscapes. This will result in landscapes that are more resilient to the impacts of climate change and poor land use management. WWF and Mondi, within the framework of the global partnership, will explore how this approach may be adapted to other contexts in the future.
“The programme is an excellent example of why businesses should have sustainable development at the centre of how they operate,” says Viv McMenamin, director of Land and Forestry at Mondi SA.
“By engaging proactively over the long term, we have demonstrated that we are part of the solution and contributed to protecting South Africa’s wetlands and strengthening wetland conservation practices.”
International partnership
In 2014, WWF and Mondi entered into a global partnership. At the outset, the partnership identified three main areas of stewardship work: ecosystem, manufacturing and product stewardship. The partnership focuses on demonstrating how sustainability and good business sense go hand- in-hand.
The aim was to continue the good progress Mondi has made in minimising the impacts of its operations on forests, climate and water, as well as encouraging more sustainable practices within and outside of the forestry industry. Ecosystem stewardship, for instance, builds and expands the scope of the existing wetlands work in South Africa, to work with neighbouring agriculture land uses in the broader landscape.
In Russia, for example, the focus is on protecting high conservation values in the boreal forests, and demonstrating that increasing productivity and conservation could work together.
Manufacturing stewardship looks at further reducing the climate and water footprint of Mondi’s operations worldwide, promoting resource efficiency, recycling, the cascading use of wood, and longevity of products.
As far as product stewardship is concerned, work focused on further enhancing the environmental performance of Mondi’s products through credible certification and efficient life-cycle use of materials in paper and packaging products.
Source: Trialogue CSI Handbook 2016