Graduate student Laura J. Shaffer, supervised by Dr. Theodore L. Gragson, will undertake research on how the relationship between spatial and temporal patchiness of natural resource distribution, as mediated by social and ecological factors, and human resource use. Her test case will be the Ronga people of Mozambique. Southern Mozambique's coastal savanna landscape is ideal for a resource use strategy study because the area is rich in floral and faunal species due to the diverse range of available habitats, which include forest, grasslands, and wetlands. This landscape's spatial and temporal heterogeneity offers Ronga horticulturists a high diversity of wild plants to harvest for various subsistence needs across the seasons. Preliminary fieldwork revealed a high dependence on natural plant resources by Ronga communities in the region for food, medicinal, shelter, and warmth needs.
The researcher will (1) analyze how social and ecological factors affect Rongan wild plant harvesting spatial and temporal patch choices; and (2) investigate how these human activities affect the plants, by monitoring the specific effects of Rongan wild plant harvests on coastal savanna vegetation diversity, abundance, and distribution. She will employ a combination of ethnographic and ecological research methods. She will consult governmental agencies and archives to gather information about historic Rongan use of wild plant resources, going back 50 years, to correlate with the oldest available aerial photos. She will map two coastal savanna communities, in which she also will gather spatial information on interhousehold networks, plants known and their uses, and plant use. This will allow her to incorporate user spatial behavior, and the factors directing it, as well as look at how resource use has changed over time.
Basic scientific research on the socioecological factors affecting human natural resource use is critical for developing realistic landscape conservation management plans that meet locally specific needs for both humans and wild species. The data gathered in the current project will be tested by developming a management plan for the Futi Transfrontier Conservation Area (TFCA). It is hoped that this plan will serve as a methodological model for documenting the community resource use information needed to create conservation plans at other sites in Mozambique, such as the Great Limpopo and Gorongoza, as well as in other parts of the world. The research also will contribute significantly to the education of a female social scientist.
