Big-game hunters pay to conserve wildlife

Big-game hunters pay to conserve wildlife

By Megan Lewis

BIRCHENOUGH, Zimbabwe (Reuter): Safari hunters are paying fat fees for the privilege of killing African big game under a unique plan to ensure the species' long-term survival.

High-paying hunters on privately owned ranches known as conservancies are tracking down lions, elephants and other game for fees ranging from US$5,000 to $40,000.

The fees are in turn used to restock the conservancies with young, healthy wildlife and the professional hunting programs have reduced poaching.

Multinational companies wanting to promote a "green" image are being encouraged to back the conservancies financially under the Communal Areas Management Program for Indigenous Resources (CAMPFIRE) plan, receiving five percent interest on their funds, which they would earmark for local African communities.

"It is a novel idea, nothing like this has been done before in Africa or the world on such a scale," Derek Henning, a founding member of the Save Valley Conservancy, in the South East Lowveld of Zimbabwe, told Reuters on a recent visit.

But the three conservancies, run by former cattle ranchers, arose from economic necessity, not ecological ideology.

Devastated by severe drought, the ranchers in desperation sought alternatives to cattle.

"When the drought ended we decided never to return to beef, which had been running at a loss for years," Henning said.

"Sustainability was the big word everybody was using at the time and wildlife looked to be the answer," he said.

The plan is to raise Z$80 million ($737.6 million) to buy surplus animals from national parks, such as buffalo, elephant, sable and roan antelope, lion and leopard -- all abundant before white settlers arrived in the early 1900s and claimed the land for their cattle.

"We are not like a national park situation where animals are left to compete with each other and if they go up or down it's just too bad. We will be controlling the population of all species and that includes lion," Henning said.

"It's fine for 'greenies' to say you must not cull animals, but when you have an area of land which is finite, the potential damage caused to the ecosystem has to be seen to believed."

But hunters are not just used to help restock conservancies, they are also taught a lesson in ecology.

"Our clients (hunters) are made to work for their kill and if that means tracking an animal for a few hours or climbing through undergrowth on their hands and knees, then that's what they'll have to do," a local safari hunter told Reuters.

"We have respect for the animals and think that paying hunters should learn that too," he said.

But the ranchers were quick to realize the Save Valley Conservancy would not work unless the black villages, which bound 84 percent of the 321,000 hectares (793,200 acres) of the conservancy's 23 amalgamated properties, also benefited.

"Land pressure is so great -- we don't see ourselves as an area of wealth in a sea of poverty, we just couldn't exist like that -- not in Africa," Henning said.

After several meetings the cattle farmers formed a trust in 1992 which in turn created a company to attract multinationals to invest or donate money to the conservancy members.

Henning said U.S. multinationals were being targeted because the main hunting clients are Americans, with one of the world's high-profile corporations on the verge of signing up.

The conservancy members pay five percent interest annually to investors, who then have the opportunity to sink their money, along with a "green" image, directly back into the black villages.

"This way investors can be assured their money will not be filtered out before it actually gets to the people," said Henning.

Local Africans will also be trained as guides and game scouts, and hired as cooks, servants and maintenance workers to cater for the conservancy's 500-bed safari camps.

"Surrounding communities have already been told if they poach wildlife the villages responsible won't receive any benefits," he said. "Word has got out and poaching levels are nowhere near what they used to be."

This gives peace of mind to the conservancy which since the late 1980s has run a breeding program in conjunction with the World Wildlife Fund (WWF) for Nature to save the endangered black rhino.

David Butcher, chief executive for WWF Australia, praised the conservancy project. "It may be, along with tourism, the only way to stop animals becoming extinct," Butcher said.

"I think you have to go to these countries to understand one of the few assets they have got is wildlife," he said.