Environment, Forestry and Tourism Minister, Pohamba Shifeta on Thursday inaugurated the construction of a N.dollars 22.7 million park management station at the Cape Cross Seal Reserve in the Erongo Region.

Cape Cross Seal Reserve is a protected and popular tourist attraction area, which is a sanctuary for the world’s largest breeding colony of Cape fur seals.

Shifeta in his remarks said the construction of the park management is geared towards biodiversity conservation, wildlife management and tourism for economic development for the country, as well as improving the livelihood of people.

He said the construction is in collaboration with the German government co-financing agreement to invest in new park infrastructure development for national parks, noting that conservation officials need to be equipped with appropriate tools and equipment to conduct their daily activities efficiently and effectively.

Shifeta highlighted that the infrastructure includes park entrance gates and signage, offices, tourism receptions, vehicle garages, staff houses and ablution blocks.

At the same event, Shifeta also launched the new management plans for the Skeleton Coast Park, Dorob National Park and Namib Naukluft Park set out for objectives and guidelines for management and development over a period of 10 years.

“The plans represent policies and interventions of the ministry and provide for mechanisms to strengthen collaboration with user groups of the parks and other stakeholders. It also makes provision to identify new tourism concessions in an effort to largely contribute to economic development and improve livelihood of communities,” he noted.

Ambassador of Germany to Namibia, Herbert Beck said Germany has been supporting Namibia’s parks programme for over 20 years to a tune of N.dollars 1.1 billion to continuously ensure the protection of the ecosystems and biodiversity.

“Cape Cross nature reserve is famous for the Cape fur seals and it is also a unique ecosystem with its beautiful coastline which includes some of the most important bird areas on earth and should be protected accordingly,” he noted.

Source: The Namibian Press Agency