Botswana And Zambia Ban Sport Hunting

Someday, this activity will be as reprehensible as defecating in public. 

No Trophy Hunting in Botswana and Zambia?

Posted by Steve Boyes of National Geographic Expeditions in Explorers Journal on January 22, 2013

Botswana and Zambia, two premier wildlife destinations, recently banned all trophy hunting within a few months of each other. This move heralds a major shift in thinking about how Africa’s wildlife resources will be managed in the future. Why did they do this? In short: Corruption fueling unsustainable hunting and poaching that threatens species survival. Photographic safari operators, like Wilderness Safaris, have been taking over the premier safari destinations from hunting operations for decades. What is the future of sport hunting in Mozambique and Zimbabwe where the same problems exist?

Africa is home to the largest remaining migrations on earth, the last prides of lion, the gorillas and chimpanzees, and most of the remaining elephant and rhinoceros. All kept safe on the most valuable wildlife properties on the planet.

Are we adequately protecting priceless wildlife resources? Right now, tourists from around the world coming to Africa to photograph the continent’s wildlife are the biggest conservationists by far. The operators and establishment owners that attract these tourists by selling the dream of an African photographic safari are the new ambassadors for conservation.

“Putting bums in beds” is funding millions of square miles of protected areas throughout Africa. Ecotourism adds value to wilderness by creating jobs and teaching people to be proud of their wildlife. We need to do everything possible to make all major safari destinations in Africa accessible and marketable. Travelers must feel safe when they come to Africa.   

Africa’s “Great Work”, the extraordinary monument to the peoples of Africa, is the vast wildernesses that have remained wild since the dawn of time. This could, at long last, be the “African Century” with a united continent benefitting from vast mineral and fossil fuel reserves. More education, more opportunity, more prosperity without waste. A rising Africa wants to protect the continent’s natural heritage and global legacy.

Saving the great parks and wildernesses of Africa is becoming part of African national pride. Botswana must be proud that they have the largest remaining elephant population on earth. As South Africans we must be proud to have the largest rhino population in the world. Rwanda must be proud of the mountain gorilla. Tanzania proud of the largest lion population anywhere.

Africans are beginning to realize that our wilderness areas are not endless and that what we have left, the Serengeti, Okavango, Congo, Luangwa, Massai-Mara, Kruger, Namib… are, in fact, global treasures to be proud of. Africa needs things to be proud of in these troubled times. 

National Geographic Expeditions "On Safari in Southern Africa By Private Air" in 2012/13. These tourists coming to photograph Africa's wildlife are probably the continent's biggest conservationists. (Carol Guy)

An elephant's scene. "An image from the ODP photosafari that I recently led, on board the Nguni Voyager, Chobe River, Botswana. A small herd of elephants were feeding on on the banks of the river at sunset. The light had got too dark to shoot anything other than silhouettes, so with the use of a flash i managed this picture. The look-alike stars are actually insects lit up by the flash." (Brendon Cremer / outdoorphoto.co.za)

National Geographic Expedition stops to look at a clan of hyenas moving down a dry river near Mashatu Camp (Northern Tuli, Botswana). (Steve Boyes)

The dogs of war, photographed by guide Stephen Cunliffe (stevecunliffe.com) at Liuwa Plains National Park, Zambia. "When a superior predator arrived, the dogs refused to go quietly and put up a staunch defence against the thieving hyena" (Stephen Cunliffe)

Elephants enjoying a drink in the Mashatu area (N Tuli, Botswana) as a game drive vehicle moves past in the background. The 1,000 elephants in the area are completely habituated to vehicles and do not run away when approached. They needed to lear that the rumbling of a LandRover did not always mean trouble. (Hunting Legends / www.huntinglegends.com)

African elephants moving across a dry and dusty floodplain in the Mombo area. Breeding herds are very protective of their new borns, preferring to stay on smaller islands where there are less lions and hyenas. (Steve Boyes)

Lasting memories being created... These National Geographic Expedition guests are surrounded by the Endangered African wild dog or painted hunting dog that usually lives in fear of humans. (Steve Boyes)

African wild dogs are among the most beautiful canids on earth. On this expedition the guests saw these amazing dogs twice in the Okavango Delta, watching them playing together next to the vehicle. A privilege only made possible through habituation. (Steve Boyes)

Bloodied wild dog. Photographed by Edward Peach guide of Ivory Tree Game Lodge, South Africa. "One of the Pilanesberg's wild dogs waiting for a response from the rest of the pack after calling them to share the impala that two of them caught." (Edward Peach)

National Geographic Expedition expert and guests photographing a herd of buffalo in Mala Mala along the Sand River (Sabi Sands, South Africa). (Steve Boyes)

Herd of buffalo move past the LandRover and behave as they would if lions were following them. Photographed here making more buffalo at Mala Mala. (Steve Boyes)

A large pride of lions needs to kill a buffalo or a zebra everyday to sustain itself. The Okavango Delta is the scene of an endless struggle between life and death. (Steve Boyes)

Ray of light. Photographed by guide Marius Coetzee of Oryx Photographic Tours at Leopard Hills, South Africa. (Marius Coetzee)

Alarm bells ringing!!!

By the end of 2012, the alarm bells for wildlife war had been ringing for years.

Almost 700 rhino slaughtered in South Africa and Zimbabwe in a year. An estimated 25,000 elephant killed the year before all over Africa. The bushmeat and illegal wildlife trade has boomed in recent years on the continent.

Botswana protected areas raided by poachers on horseback for several years. We recorded evidence of poachers killing lechwe in what we thought was an inaccessible, untouched wilderness on the 2012 Okavango Wetland Bird Survey (www.okavangofilm.com).

Over 20% of the global population of African grey parrots are being harvested from the wild every year. Millions of green pigeons are being smoked as bushmeat in the Congo. Over 1,200 dead tree pangolins from Africa were confiscated by Indonesian authorities who discovered the 260 cartons of frozen pangolins weighing 5 tonnes.

Bushmeat markets flourish in and around Maputo in Mozambique as poaching escalates in the north. Poaching operations in Zambia are being supported by light aircraft. Illegal bushmeat is being smuggled by truck out of Tanzania. Rebel armies in central and West Africa feed themselves from the forests and grasslands. 

Is it justifiable in this day-and-age to hunt one of the last big tusker elephants for $100,000? Is it ethical to shoot crocodiles that are over 100 years old and elephants that are nearing 70?

Is it possible to conserve large tracts of land in Africa without hunting adding value to wildlife? Do we need to draw a line between sourcing organic meat for your family and shooting a prize wild animal for a trophy? Most especially do we need to hunt in unfenced wilderness areas where animals roam free or could we restrict hunting to areas managed specifically for this purpose? Prize wildlife is traded at lucrative markets, resulting in increasing trophy sizes on most game farms in South Africa. Trophy sizes are going down in all wild areas… 

Botswana and Zambia ban trophy hunting

Shocking declines in wildlife populations in northern Botswana 0ver the last 15-20 years has encouraged government to halt issuance of hunting licenses from January 2013, effectively banning all forms of hunting by 2014. This has been hailed by local conservationists and tourism operators as a visionary move by the President of Botswana, Lieutenant General Ian Khama, who sees the lasting legacy of being one of the only African countries left with healthy wildlife populations at the end of this decade. Hunting and photographic safari operations cannot operate alongside each other, as the latter need to habituate wildlife to game-viewer vehicles and people on foot. Hunting operations nearby makes wildlife viewing very difficult and sometimes quite dangerous. 

The Botswana Environmental Ministry explains that: ”The shooting of wild game for sport and trophies is no longer compatible with our commitment to preserve local fauna.”

This move has ostracized the professional hunting community in Botswana and polarized the local safari industry. Many professional hunters may have to seek alternative employment and then have to turn to poaching. Botswana will continue issuing “special game licences” for traditional hunting by local communities (e.g San and baYei) within designated wildlife management areas. Botswana government must be ready for a reaction by poachers and unemployed hunters.

Zambia is also taking the threat of further declines in wildlife numbers very seriously. Last year, newly-elected Zambian President, Michael Sata, dissolved the board of the Zambian Wildlife Authority (ZAWA), stating that Zambia would halt the syndicates that have dominated their hunting industry for decades. Earlier this month, The Times of Zambia reported that hunting had been banned in 19 Game Management Areas in Zambia for a period of one year.

The Zambian Minister of Tourism and Arts, Sylvia Masebo, also closed all leopard, lion and elephant hunting across the country, basing her decision on corruption and malpractice between hunting operators and government departments. 

She also fired the Director-General of the ZAWA and launched an in-depth criminal investigation of ZAWA.

Botswana and Zambia are taking the preservation of their natural heritage far more seriously than previous decades. This bodes well for the designation of the Okavango Delta as a UNESCO World Heritage Site and the advancement of regional partnerships like OKACOM and the Kavango-Zambezi Transfronteir Conservation Area (KAZA-TFCA).

We have opportunity in the KAZA-TFCA (Angola/Zambia/Botswana/Namibia) to create the largest protected area on earth in support of almost 50% of the world’s elephants. 

Many top economists write about “Africa rising”, as the continent gets rid of corruption and benefits more from abundant natural resources. Should we expect more hunting bans on the continent this year?

Title: "Monster Elephant"... This old bull elephant was most likely not a monster, but rather one of the last-remaining "big tuskers" in Africa. In the 1850s there were many reports of mammoth-size elephant in the Kalahari and mammoth-size tusks were exported. Today these massive bulls are no longer seen. The wildlife of Africa needs a few decades to recover from the last few hundred years of carnage. (Hunting Legends / www.huntinglegends.com)

Cape buffalo with hunter. Buffalo are the most dangerous member of the "Big 5" and are a sought after trophy in Botswana, where they are largely restricted to protected areas due to the cattle industry. (Global Hunting Resources / https://www.facebook.com/GlobalHuntingResources)

Hippopotamus are the protectors of the remotest reaches of the inland deltas of Africa and have been hunted almost to extinction for their ivory throughout most of their distributional range. Dead hippo photographed here in Mozambique. Wildlife populations need to be given time to recover before further hunting is allowed in Mozambique. (Hunting Legends / www.huntinglegends.com)

Crocodile shot dead on a sandbank... This 15+ foot nile crocodile was probably over 100 years old and planning on living for another few decades. If we farm crocodiles, why do we need to shoot them in the wild? (Hunting Legends / www.huntinglegends.com)

"Danger in the forest"... A poacher hunting in a restricted area was caught on the camera trap. There will come a time when there are simply no birds or animals in these grand forests. What is the alternative to bushmeat? (John Hart / Maurice Emetshu / www.bonoboincongo.com)

Alan: The rest of this story is at http://newswatch.nationalgeographic.com/2013/01/22/no-trophy-hunting-in-botswana-and-zambia/