ABSTRACT
With limited help from the government and its agencies, managing common natural resources, such as pastures, water supplies, forests and wildlife, falls under the ambit of local communities under a system of communal land tenure. The role of social and solidarity organisations in managing these resources has remained understudied. This chapter assesses the significance of the solidarity management of common natural resources by solidarity organisations in rural Zimbabwe. The Fast Track Land Reform Program in Zimbabwe in the 2000s expanded the quantity of common natural resources in areas previously owned under freehold tenure by white commercial farmers, which were then converted into communal land following the land reform process. Effective management of all available resources is crucial in rural Zimbabwe, where anthropo-economic activity and climate change are affecting ecosystems with implications for livelihoods and food security. Using a qualitative approach that comprises primary data from interviews, a desktop survey and source materials (archival, governmental and organisational records), grounded in social capital theory as an analytical framework, this chapter assesses the effectiveness of social and solidarity management of natural resources in rural Zimbabwe. The study clarifies the economic, political and cultural obstacles that rural communities face when trying to manage these common property natural resources. The chapter found that in the absence of strong state-led management of natural resources in rural communities, sustained development in rural Zimbabwe depends on the management of these valuable common goods by social and solidarity organisations.
