Scientific support for sustainable land and resource management in the Okavango basin

The Okavango basin with its variety of savannah woodlands and wetland ecosystems linked by the central lifeline of the Okavango River is a global hot-spot of accelerating change and land use conflicts. The river has its source in the rainy highlands of Angola and terminates in the Okavango Delta, the world's largest inland delta and the largest freshwater swamp south of the equator. The TFO project will analyze ecosystem functions and services within this trans-boundary basin of high international visibility and high potential transferability of results to other tropical and sub-tropical regions.

Photo of the day - 20 May 2013  Angola: Woodland margin with termite mounds (Photo: Manfred Finckh)  « yesterday tomorrow »

News TFO was represented by a team of 20 TFO members at the LAMA status conference in Berlin from April 17 to 19 and presented the project to the more than 400 guests, representatives of the BMBF, the project management PT and other colleagues from both modules of the LAMA funding measure via a suit of presentations, posters and a market place. more TFO will be presented at the African Adaptation Knowledge Workshop in Nairobi, Kenya, on 5-6 February 2013. The workshop is organised by the Africa Adaptation Knowledge Network (AAKNet) which is an initiative facilitated by UNEP. more The reports of the two workshops held in Hamburg on szenarios and site-specific results are now available. Hamburg, 1-2 November 2012    Hamburg,11-12 December 2012 From 11 to 12 December, the first TFO Site Workshop was held in Hamburg, Germany. The meeting was dedicated to present intermediate results from all field sites and the catchment to advance data integration. more The latest TFO publication "A Conceptual Framework for “The future Okavango Project” (TFO): Research on Ecosystem Services and Landuse in the Okavango Basin" as well as the “TFO Science Portrait 1” are now available under the Downloads section. GLUES releases a short film on the TFO project and the Okavango region. Watch this film on Vimeo The Deutsche Welle, Germany’s international broadcaster, aimed at international markets, featured an article about TFO on October, 29. Interviews with TFO participants give insights into the work of the project, featuring amongst others Fernanda Lages, coordinator for Angola, and Manfred Finckh, member of subproject SP05. The article and the interview, both in Portuguese, can be accessed via the Deutsche Welle Website The next Workshop on Scenario building is about to take place in Hamburg (1-2 November). more Book launch by Subproject SP07 members: The book Knowledge lives in the lake. Case studies in environmental and customary law from southern Africa was launched in Windhoek (30 August 2012) by its editors Manfred O. Hinz, Oliver C. Ruppel and C. Mapaure. It features the works of law students from the University of Namibia and focuses on various water related issues. more TFO's hydrology team (subproject SP02) just conducted a capacity building workshop for university students and staff of the Angolan Ministry for Energy and Water to introduce hydrological modeling. The workshop was held at Agostinho Neto University in Luanda, Angola from July 31st to August 3rd 2012. more The review trip in Botswana and Namibia was conducted at the end of August (27-31). more Okavango river selected as a finalists for the Thiess International Riverprize in 2012: The prize will be awarded at the International Riversymposium, the world’s leading river management conference in Melbourne in October 2012. TFO represented at Okavango Basin Management Committee (OkBMC) Workshop in Rundu (18-20 July). The main focus was the drafting of the Annual Operational Plan for the Okavango River Basin based on the National Action Plan (NAP). On 6 June, the first TFO-Workshop on scenario development organized by Subproject SP08 was held in Gießen. more TFO is now formally endorsed by the Permanent Okavango River Basin Water Commission (OKACOM). This was a result of the 18th annual OBSC meeting in Luanda, Angola. TFO is represented at the 18th annual Okavango Basin Steering Committee (OBSC) meeting in Luanda, Angola. TFO present at the GLUES workshop on stakeholder integration in Berlin (8-9 May).  Minutes in German language TFO-Workshop on future perspectives & ESS methodology in Hamburg (3-4 May). more TFO participation at the GLUES workshop on Ecosystem Services in Berlin (16-18 April). TFO aired on Tagesthemen: Yesterday, the ARD programme "Tagesthemen" aired a broadcast on climate change and sustainable land use in Namibia and Botswana. The broadcast showed TFO's work, in particular the efforts of subproject SP03 (soil science) and SP10 (stakeholder engagement) who develop sustainable farming strategies together with local farmers. Watch TV broadcast TFO-Workshop on future perspectives & ESS methodology in Braunschweig (2–3 February). more TFO stakeholder participation workshop in Marburg. more TFO introduced at COP 17 side event in Durban: GLUES introduced the LAMA programme’s African examples (TFO and SuLaMa) and their regional specific approaches to investigate the interactions of climate change, land management and ecosystem services at the COP 17 side event “Adapting NRM in Africa: lessons learnt, ways forward and the sustainable land management programme”. The TFO progress report presents first results, achievements and next steps at the project and sub-project level to date and is now available under the Downloads section. TFO workshop on stakeholder participation “A conceptual framework for reflection and its application” (13 December 2011, Philipps University, Marburg, Germany): The subproject SP10 invites participants to support the TFO team in the process of identifying the most efficient stakeholder participation strategy while also enabling the participants to develop specific participation profiles for their individual research activities. more With more than 130 delegates, representing the three participating African countries Angola, Botswana and Namibia and Germany, the TFO workshop started with a keynote address given by the Hon. Minister of Environment, Wildlife and Tourism, Botswana, Dr O.K. Mokaila. more The updated programme for the coming TFO workshop in Maun, Botswana is now available under the Events section. Upcoming TFO events and other relevant activities (international meetings, conferences etc.) are from now on retrievable under the Events section. Inaugural TFO "all participants" workshop (11-13 October 2011, Maun, Botswana): All participants are cordially invited to join the first all participants workshop to incorporate stakeholder involvement, consolidate interdisciplinary initiatives and plan the interim evaluation report. more An update of the TFO calendar 2011 containing travel data of all subprojects is now available in the internal area. The Future Okavango had been invited to present the project at the extraordinary meeting of Okavango Basin Steering Committee (OBSC) in Johannesburg on April 14th. A delegation of three TFO Project members, Prof. Dr. Wellington Masamba (ORI-Botswana), Dr. Patrick Klintenberg (DRFN-Namibia) and Dr. Thomas Falk (PUM Germany) travelled to Johannesburg and Prof. Masamba gave a 30 Minutes presentation and the participants then discussed project issues with OBSC.Information and minutes of the OBSC Meeting can be downloaded by project members internal area. On March 18th 2011 TFO subproject SP10 held a stakeholder workshop at Seronga, Botswana. Local stakeholders were informed about the project and participants discussed relevant aspects of future research. Minutes can be downloaded by projectmembers in the internal area. On March 15th 2011 a TFO Stakeholder workshop was held at Mashare Namibia. Local stakeholders were informed about the project and participants discussed relevant aspects of future research. Minutes can be downloaded by projectmembers in the internal area. The workshop 'Integration of ecological and socio-economic work in TFO: from ecosystem functions to ecosystem services’ was held from March 2nd to 3rd, 2011 in Braunschweig, Germany. Results of the workshop are downloadable for TFO members in the internal area. A flyer on the TFO project is now available in the download section. Two new documents - a German brochure and an English presentation - introducing the background, aims and strategies of the TFO project can be downloaded in the download section. The descriptions of three more subprojects are now available on the website: SP01  SP02  SPC The descriptions of the subprojects are now complete. The descriptions of four more subprojects are now available on the website: SP03  SP04  SP06  SP09.1 The descriptions of the following subprojects are now available on the TFO website: SP05  SP07  SP08  SP09.2  SP10 The minutes of the meeting of the German TFO consortium held in Pevestorf on the 9 and 10 September 2010 has been made available for download. The report on the TFO kick-off-trip and the preliminary research site selection in Botswana, Namibia and Angola has been made available for download. The website of "The Future Okavango" project (TFO) has been released on the 21 December 2010.