African Elephant summit roars to life

African Elephant summit roars to life

Mako Jerera

Representatives of countries in the world on Monday gathered in Zimbabwe’s Hwange National Park for the four-day Elephant Summit, seeking to build consensus on the management of the largest animal on land and wildlife conservation.

The platform seeks to discuss the growing burden of elephant overpopulation and the impact of the existing ban on international trade in ivory. Countries are expected to build consensus on elephant management and wildlife conservation, and to come up with a common position in preparation of the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species (CITES) 19th Conference of Parties (COP 19) to be held in November 2022 in Panama.

This year’s Conference in Hwange National Park marks the first time African countries convened independently of the outside world to talk about wildlife conservation, in particular elephants management, to reflect on successes, failures and challenges without the influence of Western national and International Non-Governmental Organisations (NGOs).

The continued growth in elephant populations in Zimbabwe has resulted in severe ecological complications and serious human-conflict in communities adjacent to national parks, as animals continuously stray into human in search for settlements in search for food and water..

Speaking on the sidelines of the Conference at Hwange, Minister of Environment, Climate, Tourism and Hospitality Industry Mangaliso Ndlovu reiterated the need for African states to re-engage on the contentious issues around wildlife conservation in order to come up with a hybrid set of recommendations that can be tabled to the international community and solve conservation challenges.

He said that if the ballooning wildlife population is left unchecked, the country was likely to struggle to control the animals whose population is growing at a rate of 0,5 percent per annum. He therefore reiterated the country’s position that African countries who are home to the world’s largest elephant head, must be able to find a solution to the current ivory trade ban and a resultant moratorium culling of elephants by the international community who make the bulk of decisions in CITES.

Western countries and animal rights activists have been opposing the ivory trade arguing that increased poaching is threatening the survival of African elephants, while conservationists in Zimbabwe, however, continue to argue that selling off of the country’s ivory stockpiles, now estimated to be worth US$600 million dollars, will help fund national conservation efforts.

While Southern Africa is home to half of Africa’s elephant population, Zimbabwe, which has the second-largest herd after Botswana, has a population of more than 84,000 elephants against a carrying capacity of 40,000, and the country in particular, is a big player in elephant conservation and management because of the large population of its animals.

Minister Ndlovu said that President Mnangagwa had set the tone for engagement and re-engagement around many issues and wildlife management and conservation was also fit for that process before the country and the rest of like-minded African states go to Panama for the CITES Conference of the Parties 19 meeting in October this year.

The Minister said communities that are affected by elephants must be in a position to tell their story in order to influence change.
“We expect that communities will take the prominent roles, we expect that we get the views of the people who are living with these wild animals, specifically elephants, how they have been interacting with them and how we can continue to support communities because, literally they are taking custody of this world resource so we want to ensure the communities take centre stage and this is one of our key points as we are going to CITES that we need to have a specific segment or permanent sub-committee that comes from their side so that their voices are heard at all times,”

During the first two days of the conference, participants have been focusing on the technical aspects of the issues around wildlife conservation as they seek to emphasise the importance of making science based decisions.

The Minister said holding the conference in the national park was significant in that it was a befitting venue as it would allow participants to have a first hand experience of the devastating effects of elephant overpopulation.