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Tinashe Farawo Correspondent
NEXT week, Botswana hosts the world’s biggest elephant population summit in the town of Kasane.
Heads of State from Kavango Zambezi Transfrontior Conservation Areas, comprising Angola, Botswana, Namibia, Zambia and Zimbabwe are expected to attend.
The summit is important because the issue of wildlife has become the subject of intense debate, with most NGOs and Western media criticising the region in general and Botswana in particular over alleged wanton killing of animals.
Although elephants are endangered globally, Southern African elephants are not and the unity of purpose which is being shown by the bloc in its quest to sustainably utilise its wildlife is a move in the positive direction.
The clarion call within the region is communities must benefit and efforts are being made throughout the region to ensure that communities which bear the brunt of wildlife benefit, through infrastructure development, schools construction, clinics, roads, employment creation and provision of medicine in these clinics.
Henceforth, the upcoming elephant summit in Botswana will be a game changer in wildlife management because countries will be meeting at the highest level.
Southern Africa is home to the largest population of elephants on the continent, with 75 percent of these elephants found within the Kavango Zambezi Transfrontier Conservation Area.
The African elephant has always been a subject of interest and a topic that provokes intense discussion on the international fora such as the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species (CITES), albeit with little or no common ground established.
Moreover, international media coverage of the elephant has tended to ignore the plight of rural communities who bear the brunt of living with elephants and yet National Parks authorities in these Southern African nations have grappled with this issue of elephant population management.
Botswana recently consulted its citizens on the possibility of lifting or suspending the hunting ban.
There is no doubt, the search for effective measures and a lasting solution to challenges posed by elephants is one that has engrossed governments in Southern Africa, especially those in the Kavango Zambezi Transfrontier Conservation Area, or simply KAZA TFCA.
The Summit, which runs from May 3-7 in the Botswana town of Kasane and will be attended by Heads of State from the KAZA countries, couldn’t have been any more appropriate and decisions are expected to be made with regards to wildlife management.
Kasane is situated at the far north-eastern corner of Botswana close to Africa’s “Four Corners”, where four of the KAZA TFCA countries —Botswana, Namibia, Zambia and Zimbabwe — almost meet.
This is the location of the Kasane Elephant Summit where environment ministers and Heads of State from countries that form the Kavango Zambezi Transfrontier Conservation Area will converge to propose recommendations for the management of Southern Africa’s elephant population.
The government of Botswana has found it prudent to organise a summit to generate a better understanding of elephant management and associated challenges.
The summit will also come up with a series of measures to be undertaken in order to address the elephant challenges more efficiently and effectively with the influence of the KAZA initiative.
The theme of the summit is “Towards a Common Vision for the Management of Southern Africa’s Elephant” while the objectives of this Elephant Summit will, among other things, be to raise awareness on the current status of the African elephant in the Southern African region.
The summit will also seek to achieve an exchange of ideas on human-elephant conflict, illegal and legal trade as well as to find a common ground on concrete interventions to address the challenges posed.
Human-elephant conflict remains a topical issue not only in Zimbabwe but in Southern Africa, especially within the Kavango Zambezi Transfrontier Conservation Area.
The summit has come hot on the heels of KAZA TFCA meeting which was held in Victoria Falls last month and Ministers of Environment met and resolved to support Botswana in its fight to sustainably utilise its elephants.
Botswana recently lifted the ban on trophy hunting and it has been the subject of ridicule from NGOs and Western media.
The challenges of poaching notwithstanding, elephants in Southern Africa continue to be found outside protected areas.
This poses additional challenges for wildlife authorities and wildlife managers, as levels of human-elephant conflict continue to escalate especially where human and agricultural expansion moves into new areas already occupied by the animals.
In Zimbabwe, more than 200 people have been killed in human-wildlife conflict and nearly 40 percent of these are human-elephant conflict.
More than 7 000 hectares of crops have been destroyed and thousands of livestock killed over the last five years.
To this end, humans in these wildlife areas have to constantly contend with elephants that threaten their lives and food security.
In short, communities are losing their livelihoods from these animals, hence the need to join hands within the region and ensure that communities benefit from this rich natural resource.
If communities benefit from these resources, they will definitely view these animals as economic opportunities and without doubt the future of our wildlife will be guaranteed.
There is also the serious issue of poaching across Africa although the problem has not had the same impact in Southern Africa due to some effective measures implemented by various wildlife authorities in the affected countries.
Without doubt the region has been fighting poaching through these TFCAs and joint patrols among the countries and more arrests and convictions have been recorded.
Trade conditions for elephants have also been a contentious issue.
The conditions for trade in elephants and their derivatives have been the subject of often acrimonious debate with onerous conditions being placed upon those countries whose elephant populations are currently on Appendix II.
CITES listed elephants under Appendix II, meaning these animals are not necessarily threatened by extinction but their trade requires control to avoid use that would interfere with their survival.
A moratorium on international trade has been in place since 2009 until 2017 but illegal trade has actually increased tremendously during this past decade.
On the other hand, ivory stocks held by the countries whose elephant populations are on Appendix II have continued to grow at an alarming rate.
This has in turn placed a huge burden on such countries to secure this valuable resource. For example, Zimbabwe is sitting on more than 100 000kg of ivory, from natural mortality, problem animal control as well as those recovered from poaching.
Sadly, some efforts by Southern African wildlife authorities to manage elephant populations have been subjected to constant media glare, with much coverage ignoring the plight of rural communities living with elephants totally ignored.
Tinashe Farawo is the Public Relations Manager for Zimparks.
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