Summer 1999 Sustainable Development Fieldcourse:
Africa: Wildlife, Ecotourism, & Sustainable Development
Synthesis Briefing
And
Oral Report
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Summer 1999 Sustainable Development Fieldcourse: Africa: Wildlife, Ecotourism, & Sustainable Development Synthesis Briefing
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Natural Resources and Sustainable Development in Zimbabwe
Synthesis Assignment
The purpose of this final, individual assignment is to challenge you to integrate and synthesize all you have learned in this course, both in class and in the field.
Imagine that you are briefing the Minister of Environment and Tourism of Zimbabwe, and making some major policy recommendations that you think will lead to social and economic development for Zimbabwe through the sustainable uses and management of the country's natural resources (focus on wildlife and forests). The Minister is a busy person, so you must make your points clearly and concisely. In order to do this well, you will need to consider the wide range of "stakeholders" in the use and management of Zimbabwe's wild resources, from international tourists to rural farmers. You will need to consider a range of economic scales from "macro" to "micro" and link these with ecological understanding of the resources themselves.
Before you begin, please review the overall course objectives to understand the dimensions of this challenge. Review class notes and readings; notes from briefings and talks in Harare; and field notes from our activities in the Hwange, Victoria Falls, Binga, and Muzarabani areas.
You should carefully outline and organize your thoughts, then write a "Synthesis Briefing Paper" of not more than 6-10 pages (handwritten, printed neatly, for the final version). You may include “a few” maps, diagrams, tables as attachments to amplify the “tight” summary you are presenting in the main briefing paper. This written paper is due at 9AM, Thursday, July 22.
From the synthesis paper you should prepare an 8-10 minute "Synthesis Oral Report," in which you brief the Minister on the recommendations, and your reasons for making them, as given in your Synthesis Briefing Paper. These will be presented to the class on Thursday, July 22, beginning at 9 AM. A few minutes for questions from the class and instructors will follow each oral report.
Taken together, the Synthesis Briefing Paper and Oral Report make
up 30% of your class grade.