Resource co-management: Incorporating traditional ecological knowledge into resource management frameworks

Abstract

Resource management is facilitated through various bureaucratized government agencies, which exercise policy that attempts to balance competing economic, political, and conservation interests. These agencies abide by Western ideology and Western science, which have failed to preserve ecological health and adequately represent the interests of local indigenous populations that have depended on said resources. As a result of this failure and a growth in legal requirements to consult indigenous people about the usage of land and resources, much attention has been concentrated on indigenous resources management techniques, which are inextricably linked to their ways of knowing. A review of literature on the subject revealed that TEK, when adequately included in the resource management process, is essential for the regeneration of ecological health. Still, its implementation and attempted integration have been abysmal. Therefore, the study recommends that TEK must be given the utmost respect as a cultural and spiritual belief system to be adequately incorporated. Furthermore, TEK holders must be in control of TEK and ultimately have the ability to make decisions concerning its use, productive and equivalent collaboration between Western management and TEK throughout the entire process of resource management must be adopted – as both systems are crucial to ecological regeneration, and legal mechanisms must be employed to mandate the involvement and protection of TEK to redress power imbalances so that inclusion does not rest on the goodwill of, or perceived benefit to, existing resource management agencies.