Namibia is endowed with a rich diversity of indigenous natural products and associated traditional knowledge.  This asset base and local knowledge is becoming ever more significant in contributing to poverty alleviation and conservation.  Namibia’s internationally acclaimed Community Based Natural Resource Management (CBNRM) programme has demonstrated that assigning rights over wildlife resources and economic benefits derived from the wildlife to local communities generates income for the community while improving natural resource management and conservation.  A similar trend is starting to show in the Indigenous Natural Products or INP sector.

Through public consultation MCA Namibia identified the INP sector as one of the sectors that could contribute to poverty reduction through economic growth, MCA’s overall objective.  An “INP Activity” to the value of USD6.7 million was included in the Agricultural Project of the MCA Namibia Compact and implementation has started.   The goal of the INP Activity is to increase economic opportunities for primary producers by increasing volumes of products harvested and processed and/or by adding more value to the products in Namibia.  MCA Namibia hopes to achieve this by supporting the primary producers in strengthening their organisational, business and technical capacities.  The INP Activity is expected to increase incomes for up to 9,000 primary producers and their households benefiting approximately 45,000 individuals.

The INP Activity has three sub-activities:

1.            Support to Producer and Processor Organisations

2.            INP Innovation Fund

3.            Market Information Delivery

There is also an overriding Environmental Oversight sub-activity that covers all three of the above sub-activities.

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