Hunting for Community Benefits in Conservation
This may be a controversial one. When we were recently at Lake Mburo National Park, we talked for a while with the Conservation Area Manager (formerly called ‘Chief Warden’). As with Bwindi Impenetrable National Park, a major challenge has been to deal with animals ranging outside the protected area since there are no fences around Uganda’s parks.
The cattle herders around Lake Mburo have tended to see the wild animals as competing with their livestock for pasture, water and salt. Also, leopards from the park sometimes kill livestock.
There is no compensation for cattle or crops lost to wild animals. As a result wild animals can often end up killed when they move outside the park – it is impossible to enforce protection over such a large area.
These conflicts are part of a problem that has long hindered conservation in Uganda. According to the Uganda Wildlife Authority UWA “The attitude of communities towards the wildlife and protected areas was not conducive for wildlife conservation. By mid 1990s wildlife had drastically reduced in the countryside.”
UWA is responsible for all Uganda’s National Parks. Within these areas animals are protected. UWA is also responsible for wild animals (aside from fisheries) outside national parks: some animals (such as chimpanzees and leopards) are legally protected everywhere while others (such as rats and baboons) can be legally killed as vermin.
For several years UWA has piloted a rather controversial solution to problems with the communities around Lake Mburo: trophy hunting. Large sums are paid by hunters to shoot an animal. This payment is then divided among the land-owner, other local people and the managing institutions. This hunting is controlled and only takes place on private land outside the park (never inside).
I admit my first reaction was negative. The image is distasteful to me: I picture wealthy people shooting animals for fun while surrounded by poor local people who would risk punishment for harming the same animal even when they damage their livelihoods. (I am also a vegetarian).
But I also think of myself as a pragmatic conservationist. And (whatever our personal reactions to it are) it appears hunting brings benefits for conservation and people. These claims are supported by facts.
Since 2001 UWA in collaboration with Rurambiira Community Wildlife Association, a community-based organisation, have made a pilot project to examine community based sport hunting.
According to UWA’s documents the objectives of the project were to:
- Provide incentive to landowners to manage and protect wildlife on their land by giving wildlife as a resource an opportunity to demonstrate its economic value to landowners.
- Contribute towards reduction of the human-wildlife conflicts among the people surrounding Lake Mburo National Park.
- Positively change the attitude of residents on ranches towards wildlife and conservation.
- Provide lessons and information that would guide UWA management in developing guidelines and procedures for implementation of hunting as a wildlife management and conservation tool outside protected areas.
The pilot appears successful on all counts. Animal numbers outside the park have swelled dramatically. Community relationships have improved. Now the communities see value in allowing these animals to survive. There is even competition to buy up the land around the National Park for game ranching.
Paradoxically controlled hunting in this landscape seems to improve the overall animal numbers. It may have helped lions to return to Mburo as mentioned in a previous blog.
What is the lesson? Perhaps we can see parallels with those who are against tourists visiting mountain gorillas due to the disease transfer risk. These risks may be real but the increased tourist revenues bring real benefits and subsequent improved conservation. How to balance the pros and cons? These are real questions. They certainly make me think.
