Seeing a photo like this after spending two weeks in the African bush was not only disheartening but disturbing and distasteful. It is a photo of a trophy hunter whose only goal was to kill a wild animal and take a photo of himself with it. What cruelty! What an incredible waste of life!
My sentiments emerge from the context of environmentalism that advocates a respect for Nature, especially against needless killing. However aghast we may be about trophy hunting in Africa, today it has another context that certainly was surprising to me: it is considered a tool for conservation. Our safari group talked about this issue with James, one of the game drivers and guides, and the topic has so interested me that I followed up with a little bit more research.
Before colonialism, animals in the wild had been been killed by native Africans for meat to feed the tribe. However, they only killed what they needed because they lived under the moral principle of "Ubuntu", which the African Journal of Social Work (AJSW) defines as:
"A collection of values and practices that people of Africa or of African origin view as making people authentic human beings (italics added). While the nuances of these values and practices vary across different ethnic groups, they all point to one thing – an authentic individual human being is part of a larger and more significant relational, communal, societal, environmental and spiritual world."
In other words, despite various tribal and ethnic definitions of what Ubuntu is, Africans generally agree (and still believe) that Ubuntu encompasses the interdependence of humans on one another, and it acknowledges each person's responsibility to others and the world around him/her. It is a philosophy that supports collectivism over individualism.
Ubuntu can be also summed up as an approach to life that gives human beings their humanity, which comes from conforming to or being part of the tribe. Killing just for the sake of killing is not human, and it violates a moral order in the world that shapes and regulates behavior into doing what is right for the good of the whole.
Although Ubuntu may be elusive for us modern persons, taking care of the Earth and its creatures has morphed into care for the environment and conservation. It is an intentional stance on our relationship with the world and Nature that aims to right the wrongs of the past and to move forward and beyond the dark, raw urges of dominance, winning at all costs, and other forms of rapacious behavior.
A Brief History of Conservation
European colonialism exploited Africa in the 19th and early 20th centuries in a quest for mineral resources needed to its feed hungry manufacturing enterprises back home. Along with colonialism, Europeans were hunting everywhere and fighting each other for exclusive rights to hunting grounds. Among the many dreadful consequences of these actions was that some species were disappearing. So, in order to preserve wildlife and protect their hunting activities, the colonialists had to find ways of protecting the animals' habitat.
They accomplished this goal by
developing a reserve system on certain designated lands and by banning the hunting of
certain animals like hippos and elephants who were being over-killed. In 1899, the Mweru Marsh Reserve was created as the first protected area followed by the
Luangwa Game Reserve in 1904, a small reserve around the Victoria Falls
in 1907, and the Kafue Reserve in 1908. I was unable to find out when the park that we visited, Mosi-oa-Tunya National Park in Zambia, was created, but it became so precious, it was named a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 1989. Victoria Falls, one of the Seven Natural Wonders of the World, is a part of this 25-square-mile park.
In 1925, copper was discovered in Zambia, which led to an increase of employed workers--and their need for protein (i.e., game meat) to nourish them. As rail and road infrastructure grew, the illegal commercial exploitation of game became more widespread. After World War I, firearms became more accessible and rural populations exponentially increased their hunting activities. Meanwhile, farmers demanded that there be some sort of control over wildlife as they saw a depleted supply of animals and the threat of disease-carrying insects like the tsetse fly increase. These phenomena resulted in the government's decision to protect wildlife by introducing new conservation measures, game management, the formation of an elephant control unit, and the issuing of licenses to limit hunting.
Over the next 20 years, government realized that balancing the need for game reserves with the
needs of the local people had become a logistical problem. Not only were
elephants eating people's gardens and farmers' crops, but hunters were reducing wildlife populations. During the 1930s economic depression as people lost their jobs, they relied on hunting to provide food for their families. When the economy recovered, however, the workers went back to the mines and "subsistence hunting" decreased. This trend illustrated the relationship between poverty and the hunting activity of the local people.
On January 1, 1940, the Department of Game and Tsetse Control was created to adopt clear policy with an ecological
approach to the conservation of wildlife. Controlled Hunting Areas (CHA) were also created to enable residents to hunt freely and non-residents to hunt with special licenses. By 1953 these CHAs covered 56% of Zambia. Sixteen game
reserves were also established.
In 1945, the first game-proof fences were
built to prevent game animals from going back on land that had
been cleared as protection against the tsetse fly. However, as rural
populations increased, more large game animals were being killed outside
of protected areas.
The first Honorary Game Rangers were appointed for law enforcement and animal conflict control. For over 70 years the Unit recruits volunteers from across Zambia to help with law enforcement, education and public awareness campaigns as well as to provide technical advice and additional resources to the Department of National Parks and Wildlife.
These game rangers in Mosi-oa-Tunya National Park near Livingstone, Zambia, protect the white rhinos from poachers. We found them near one of the borders of the park, which was separated by this fence (below). The park currently has ten southern white rhinos, including calves. These are not indigenous to Zambia; they were imported from South Africa. As of 2022, the park had 10 white rhinos.
Although safari tourism had begun in the mid-1920s, it did not really become popular until the 1950s and 1960s since the reserves had become easier to access by car and by air. Attitudes towards wildlife were also changing. Tourists now wanted to shoot animals with their cameras rather than with their rifles.
"Conservation through Tourism" was initiated by Norman Carr who worked for the Game Department in the 1950s. He helped set up Zambia’s first visitors camp, Nsefu Camp on the Chipela Lagoon, where guests were charged 10 shillings a night and provided with simple accommodations. They could view game on foot escorted by game guards. Norman was instrumental in setting up Kafue National Park and in developing government-run safari camps throughout the park.
Zambia won its independence from England in 1964. Meanwhile, wildlife began to be regarded as a national asset and resource to be used to benefit the people.
In 1972, the National Wildlife Protection Service (NWPS) announced the creation of 17 national parks including the smallest where our OAT group stayed: Mosi-oa-Tunya National Park. The old CHAs had been restructured and substituted with Game Management Areas. These GMAs surround the national parks and act as buffer zones so that people and wildlife can co-exist. Local people were allowed to utilize natural resources and hunt with a license.
The 1970s and 1980s experienced an economic downturn and a difficult time for conservation. Rural populations looked for new ways to survive and poaching turned out to be their answer complete with gangs leading the way. Ivory and rhino horn poaching in particular increased dramatically in Zambia and across Africa. The NPWS did not have the resources to control these gangs so non-governmental organizations (NGO) began to help protect wildlife by preventing poaching.In 1991, the government made tourism part of its economic policy as a means of generating revenue for its national coffers. The national parks offered trophy hunting and safaris as a means of protecting the animals and their habitats.
The first private-public partnership agreement between a conservation
NGO and the NWPS was instituted in 1987, the first of its kind in southern Africa and a model for other countries on the continent. The Trust handles wildlife management,
develops tourism, and works with the local communities. Ever since, conservation NGOs have been set up across Zambia to provide support and assistance for the national parks.
The Logic of Trophy Hunting
Killing game into order to save them seems counter-intuitive, but this strategy represents the core reason for trophy hunting, according to National Geographic (2015). Hunters from rich countries pay thousands of dollars (sometimes as much as $10,000) to shoot a certain species. That money is then reinvested in conservation programs and in local communities.
Trophy
hunting also addresses the idea that killing just a few animals allows
the rest to breed and produce offspring, according to www.theconversation.com. In this way animal populations can increase.
Trophy hunting is deemed a legal business by government with rules and boundaries. Game parks, for example, must apply for government-issued permits for the number and kinds of animals hunted. If animals are taken out of the country, further permits are needed for their transport.
The opposite of trophy hunting is poaching, which is illegal, uncontrolled, and can't be monitored. It inadvertently depletes the supply of animals to the point of endangering them to extinction. Poachers kill animals believing that someone else will do it if they don't, an attitude that results in massive over-exploitation. And the higher price for the animal indicates its higher demand and lower supply. Thus, the greater the price for the animal, the greater the incentive for poachers to kill as many of them as they can.
Poaching involves hunters illegally killing or capturing wild animals. Historically, it was associated with land use rights during the Renaissance where only the nobility and territorial rulers were allowed hunting privileges. It sought to prevent impoverished peasants from hunting wild game in order to feed themselves. The poaching that typically goes on in Africa is killing elephants for their tusks or rhinos for their horns and then selling these materials commercially.
Poaching
is so detrimental that in 1998 by environmental scientists from the
University of Massachusetts Amherst considered poaching the most
serious of environmental crimes
because it (1) does not protect renewable natural resources, (2) it affects
biodiversity of wildlife populations, and (3) it disturbs ecosystems.
As African countries struggle over whether to allow trophy hunting and how to prevent poaching, they are finding solutions and tools in "game management".
There are some disadvantages to the national parks, however, the biggest one being deforestation. About 65% of the fires each year are started in the national parks, and there are not enough people available to control them. During the dry season of July through September, certain grasses that catch on fire emit poisonous gases. Many local people start these fires because they have been doing it for years, and it's difficult to change their mindset, said James.
Deforestation also occurs when people cut down trees and use the wood to generate energy. The government is trying to promote the use of solar energy as an alternative, but the technology is not yet effective enough so many people continue to use wood. (The camps where we stayed all had some form of solar energy.)
Deforestation is also having a devastating effect on climate change. In Zambia, the majority population lives in the rural lands where they clear the forests for agriculture, charcoal, and fuel products, according to the World Bank.
"Other factors that contribute to the problem include, inadequate support for land use planning, poor agricultural and forestry resources management practices, untapped alternative livelihood options, and poor market access for marketable commodities and cash crops to farmers."
To address these urgent challenges, the Zambian government, with
support from the World Bank, launched a $33 million forest landscape
program in 2018. People also planted trees to replace those that have been cut down.
Despite these efforts at conservation and the case for it, some people still want to ban trophy hunting all together for many reasons.
Animal rights is a big concern as a 2017 Marist poll found that 86% of Americans were opposed to big game hunting. For example, this concern was met with outrage in 2015 when an American dentist trophy hunter killed Cecil the lion in Zimbabwe's Hwange National Park.
Biological Conservation, a highly respected scientific journal, reported that annual revenue in sub-Saharan Africa from trophy hunters was only around $201 million, compared to $36 billion made from total tourists. Revenue from trophy hunters is less than 1% of total tourism and perhaps not worth pursuing.
A 2016 US House report (“Missing the Mark”) investigating trophy hunting in sub-Saharan Africa found “many troubling examples of funds either being diverted from their purpose or not being dedicated to conservation in the first place.” The report also noted that the governments failed to deliver promised improvements in community development.
Not enough people are employed in the service of trophy hunters, so some people think there is little benefit to continuing it.
Finally, government
corruption takes a large chunk of the money earned from trophy hunters, and it never reaches the local people or the conservation programs.
Trophy hunting will probably continue despite these objections simply because there will always be people who want to hunt and feel the exhilaration of tracking animals in Africa, having their photos taken with their kill, and maybe stuffing their prey's head and mounting it on a wall at home.
The advantages and disadvantages of trophy hunting are complex and not easily reconciled. They are influenced by the times, the economics, and the politics of the day not only of Zambia and Africa but of the world. At least safaris accomplish many of conservation's and tourism's objectives without killing any animals. Yet, maybe a little Ubuntu would help! The native peoples of Africa possessed a wisdom that was more in sync with Nature than human desires, ambitions, and vanities. Like it or not, the natural world has become dependent on what human beings do to it. We are seeing the effects of this relationship as climates change throughout the world. We are learning that the ways we treat our world and its various environments will not go forward without a price.
Sources
https://www.arczambia.com/conservation/conservation-history/
https://theconversation.com/trophy-hunting-is-not-poaching-and-can-help-conserve-wildlife-29938
https://www.britannica.com/place/Zambia/External-contacts
https://www.britannica.com/explore/savingearth/the-demise-of-trophy-hunting-in-africa
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ubuntu_philosophy
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Poaching
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