NEWS
Fynbos app launched to
manage your natural veld
Heather D’Alton
Reprinted From: http://bit.ly/2FpS21b
L
andowners and harvesters who
harvest wild fynbos can now better
manage their fynbos populations
through a new cell phone application. store to a smartphone - making it acces-
sible to fynbos harvesters.
The app, called i-Fynbos, collects infor-
mation on fynbos harvested from the
wild, and allows effective monitoring
over time. Landowners and harvesters
will be able to check that their harvest-
ing is sustainable in the long term. She says, “This is as much a monitoring
effort as a citizen science project. The i-
Fynbos app makes citizen scientists out
of harvesters, who are responsible for
capturing the data. However, we recom-
mend that all information collected is
verified by a third party like Flower Val-
ley Conservation Trust.”
Around 60% of fynbos used in the bou-
quet market is harvested from natural
landscapes, because it is cheaper than
the focal flowers picked in cultivated
flower orchards. That amounts to mil-
lions of stems that are picked every year
and sold. But very little is known about
how fynbos landscapes change, due to
insufficient monitoring.
A citizen science project
responsibly, and to meet social and la-
bour compliance. During the follow-
ing six months, the app will be tested
by teams of harvesters. After this, the
app could be made available to other
harvesting sectors, such as the honey
bush industry and the medicinal plants
sector. For more information, visit:
www.flowervalley. org.za.
Where does harvested fynbos origi-
nate?
According to Kirsten Watson, Flower
Valley Conservation Trust’s Conserva-
tion Manager, “There is a need to know
where the harvested fynbos comes from
and how it’s harvested.”
Collects information
on fynbos
She says that monitoring fynbos is dif-
ficult, because of the vast landscapes
across which harvesting takes place.
“Where does one even start to evalu-
ate a property? Where do I go to look at
harvested veld?”
The i-Fynbos app provides a solution
to landowners. Kirsten says, “The app
gives you a landscape view of the prop-
erty you work on - where you’ve har-
vested, what you’ve harvested and the
quality of the harvesting. This is some-
thing we never had before. So, it’s to
empower suppliers and harvesters to
take responsibility for their monitoring.”
It’s downloaded from the Google Play-
21
Figure 1: iFynbos app on smartphone
The fynbos app came about through
funding support from the Universities
of Durham and Newcastle in the United
Kingdom, who have been working in
collaboration with Flower Valley Conser-
vation Trust and its Sustainable Harvest-
ing Programme since 2010. The Sustain-
able Harvesting Programme works with
harvesters and suppliers to pick fynbos
Figure 2 - 4: Field days and workshops
are used to show landowners and
harvesters how to use the new i-Fynbos
app.
Grassroots
Vol 18
No 4
December 2018