Mandy Driver and Philip Desmet argue that South Africa’s biodiversity economy is poised to create sustainable jobs

South Africa is a ‘megadiverse’ country – it is one of 17 countries globally whose plant, animal and ecosystem diversity far outstrips that of most others. From a development perspective, this presents huge economic opportunities, including for employment and inclusive growth. Economic activities that harness the potential of this biodiversity contribute to what has been termed the biodiversity economy.

At the launch of South Africa’s Biodiversity Economy Operation Phakisa in 2018, President Cyril Ramaphosa said that, if properly developed, the biodiversity economy could assist in accelerating transformation by providing not only employment but also business opportunities for black South Africans.

A recent investigation by the South African National Biodiversity Institute (SANBI) estimated that there were 418 000 biodiversity-related jobs in the country, with significant scope for growth in several areas.

Biodiversity-related employment falls broadly into two categories: jobs that contribute directly to conserving and managing biodiversity, numbering about 70 000, and those that depend on or use biodiversity, which number at least 350 000. Jobs in conserving and managing biodiversity are generally in the public sector, nongovernmental organisations or research institutions, and are relatively easy to quantify with certainty. Jobs that depend on biodiversity, on the other hand, span a diverse range of sectors, including nature-based tourism, wildlife ranching, fishing, traditional medicine and indigenous tea production. The figure of 350 000 can be taken as a conservative estimate, as data were not available for all biodiversity-related industries and subsectors. For example, jobs in rangeland agriculture, indigenous horticulture and floriculture, pharmaceuticals and cosmetics based on indigenous species have yet to be included in the count.

A key aspect of these employment figures is the ratio – for every job dedicated to conserving biodiversity, there are at least five jobs in other sectors that depend on biodiversity. Currently, only 1% of public-sector spending is allocated to biodiversity, but the jobs data suggest that, far from being a cost to the economy, public-sector investment to secure South Africa’s biodiversity assets should be seen as an investment in a strategic national resource that can be leveraged to create employment.

South Africa’s biodiversity assets include national parks, nature reserves, scenic natural landscapes and waterscapes, beaches, rangelands, indigenous forests, marine fish stocks, medicinal plants, iconic species, commercially important indigenous species (such as rooibos, Aloe ferox, horticultural plants and pet trade) and genetic reservoirs used for bioprospecting.

Biodiversity-related employment can be increased. In many cases, the underlying resource base is renewable if well managed, with the added advantage that many biodiversity-related jobs are likely to be located outside major centres and have relatively low skill requirements, contributing to rural development, poverty alleviation and inclusive growth.

For example, biodiversity tourism – tourism that involves the use or enjoyment of biodiversity – provided about 90 000 jobs in 2017, and domestic and international biodiversity visitors collectively spent R34-billion in South Africa. Statistics South Africa’s Tourism Satellite Account shows that tourism is a large and growing contributor to the South African economy, and the country’s striking natural scenery and rich biodiversity are popular drawcards, with beaches, wildlife and mountains some of the country’s top tourism attractions.

The biodiversity economy includes wildlife ranching, which has grown rapidly in South Africa over the past two decades. It is estimated that the wildlife economy contributed 0.3% to gross domestic product in 2015, with gross sales of R14.4-billion, generating a value-add of R9.3-billion directly and buying inputs worth a further R5.1-billion from other sectors. Employees of the sector earned aggregate gross remuneration of about R2.7-billion.

In contrast, some forms of biodiversity-related employment are at risk. An example is fishing, where the stocks of several of South Africa’s commercially important fish species are considered collapsed, putting not just direct jobs in fishing at risk but also jobs in other parts of the value chain. Another example is traditional medicine, which supports over 100 000 jobs, including traditional healers, harvesters and traders. Of South Africa’s 2 000 known medicinal plant species, only about 80 are currently threatened – but these tend to be the ones that are most heavily traded. Potential for cultivating some of these threatened medicinal species could be explored.

In addition to a wealth of biodiversity assets, South Africa has a healthy stock of ecological infrastructure – the naturally functioning ecosystems that directly generate or deliver services to people. Examples include Strategic Water Source Areas (the 10% of South Africa’s land area that delivers 50% of the country’s water), wetlands that purify water and reduce the impact of floods, estuaries that provide nursery areas for commercially important fish species, and coastal dunes that buffer settlements and built infrastructure from storm surges. The recent National Biodiversity Assessment highlighted the importance of small, high-value ecosystems that make up just 5% of South Africa’s land area but deliver disproportionate benefits.

The task of maintaining and restoring South Africa’s ecological infrastructure is currently being tackled partially, for example, through environmental public works programmes such as Working for Water, but there is scope to increase these job numbers, with multiple environmental and economic benefits.

South Africa’s biodiversity is an asset that already makes a big contribution to the economy, and that contribution could be increased. A strategy for growing biodiversity-related employment needs to tackle both public-sector-led employment creation in investing in biodiversity and ecological infrastructure and creating more opportunities for growth in the private-sector-led biodiversity economy.

Driver is senior biodiversity policy adviser at the SANBI and Dr Desmet is research associate, Department of Zoology, Nelson Mandela University