Job creation. Skills development. Career success stories. These are some of the great results CapeNature’s Keurbooms EPWP project has yielded for local communities.

Located at the picturesque Keurbooms River Nature Reserve and Robberg Nature Reserve and Marine Protected Area World Heritage Sites on the Southern Cape coast, the Keurbooms EPWP project hires local people in various EPWP positions, from maintaining infrastructure and hiking trails, clearing alien vegetation and fire-fighting to general duties.

Not only are 22 people currently working at the two protected Garden Route sites, the participants have also gained valuable conservation knowledge and skills, been exposed to tourism and customer service and some have progressed to permanent jobs, both within and outside CapeNature.

The EPWP programme has also provided workers with additional training on topics such as health and safety, first aid, practical accounting, basic computer skills, mapping, field safety and survival and more.