The Kavango West Regional Council and the Namibia Industrial Development Agency (Nida) met on Thursday to discuss a new strategy aimed at transforming the Kavango Cattle Ranch at Mangetti Farm into a profitable venture.
The initiative seeks to improve cattle health and market quality, revamp farm infrastructure, involve local youth, and integrate the farm’s elephant population into a trophy hunting scheme.
Kavango West Regional Council chairperson Joseph Sikongo expressed satisfaction with Nida’s presented report.
He emphasised the goal of operating the farm as a business to generate income for both the traditional authority and the regional council, similar to how the Mangetti National Park operates.
“We are looking at a model like the one for Mangetti National Park, where we get a small portion of funds. That is what the current president is talking about, that people should benefit from their resources,” Sikongo stated.
Despite a call from the chairperson of the National Council to the Ministry of Environment and Tourism to relocate over 200 elephants reportedly ‘terrorizing’ the farm, Sikongo said they are hoping for the ministry’s cooperation rather than relocation.
“The elephants are residents of the farm, and they can be part and parcel of our animals like cattle, because if trophy hunters come here, there are funds attached and Nida can benefit from the trophy hunting. We want the environment ministry to come on board,” he said.
Nida chief executive Richwell Lukonga highlighted the success of the new management’s strategies.
He noted that the farm has not lost a single cow to sickness in the past 12 months, which is a significant improvement.
“I’m quite happy to indicate that in the last 12 months we did not lose any cattle because of sickness and so on. We were also able to improve our market terms and the quality of our cattle,” Lukonga said.
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