by Clever Mafuta – SANF 05 no 52
Southern Africa is yet to come up with an effective strategy to manage a ballooning elephant population.
Wildlife experts who met in Zimbabwe early this month, revealed that there is need to control the increasing numbers of elephants especially in Botswana, Namibia, South Africa, Tanzania and Zimbabwe.
Southern Africa has an elephant population of around 400,000 with over 150,000 found in Botswana alone. Tanzania and Zimbabwe each have slightly over 100,000 elephants, while other notable stocks are found in Zambia (24,000), Namibia (15,000) and South Africa (14,000).
The region, which is overstocked, has a sustainable carrying capacity of 180,000 elephants. This has resulted in several instances of conflicts between the giant animal and people. In most cases elephants have encroached into villages causing damage to huts and crop fields. Some settlements have also been seen to encroach into the elephant habitats.
Without consensus on effective elephant management strategies, the “hands-off elephants” approach by mainly Europe and the United States of America might prevail over southern Africa’s desire to move the African elephant from Appendix I to Appendix II of the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Flora and Fauna (CITES). Appendix I of CITES totally bans trade in elephant products whereas Appendix II allows for limited trade.
The region’s elephant population is expected to grow to over 500,000 by 2020 if the stringent management options under CITES Appendix I are upheld at the convention’s next conference of parties to be held in 2007 in the Netherlands. The regional elephant herd is growing at rates of between three to seven percent per year.
According to wildlife experts, David Cumming and Brian Jones, southern Africa faces a daunting task of building a convincing argument on practical elephant management strategies. The management strategies being considered by experts include culling, translocation and contraception.
Translocation of elephants would only mean transferring a problem into a new place where crops would be destroyed, people killed and the environment damaged says Charles Jonga of the Communal Areas Management Programme for Indigenous Resources (CAMPFIRE).
Translocation, as much as contraception, is very expensive, while culling will result in stockpiles of elephant products as trade in such products is prohibited under CITES. Culling may also expose the region to poaching. (SARDC)
