April 2, 2012

The end looms for hunting

The Ngami Times reports that the new hunting season in northern Botswana is likely to be the last and next season will also be the final one for the Tuli Block and southern Botswana.

The government has banned hunting of wildlife, except apparently for elephants and on game farms, in favour of photographic safaris.

It will be losing millions of Pula as a result of the move through VAT payments, training levies, bed night fees, and trophy fees.

Hundreds of people from hunters to safari employees and taxidermists are expected to be out of work, and as a result it is widely anticipated that the economy of towns such as Maun and Kasane will be adversely affected.

The government will also no longer be issuing hunting quotas, which is one of the mainstays of rural communities.

The authoritative "The Hunting Report" publication said last year that "hunting would be significantly reduced in Botswana, with plains game hunting continuing only on private ranches (but) we also reported that elephant hunting would continue under a special dispensation for 粗lephant management.'

"Elephant is conspicuous by its absence from lists of animals (that cannot be hunted). That's because elephant populations in Botswana have been rising significantly, and, in the process, destroying habitat that many of these other species need. Most telling is that elephant quotas have not been reduced, rather they have been increased and more have come up for auction."

In a statement to the publication on August 26 last year, the government said: "What is being done is to encourage photographic tourism and gradually limit but not ban wildlife hunting. It must be known that species with declining numbers will be considered for limited hunting while those with increasing numbers like elephants, will continue to be hunted within CITES framework."

The Ministry (of Environment, Wildlife and Tourism) said at the time there was no plan to ban hunting "and would like to assure all hunting safari companies and affected communities that live near wildlife management areas who continue to benefit from hunting. 'No further confirmation of this could be obtained by The Ngami Times this week.

Lion hunting in Botswana was suspended in 2007 to allow the cats' population to swell as the Department of Wildlife said there was a dwindling number of lions in the Khutse Game Reserve, Central Kalahari Game Reserve (CKGR) and the Kgalagadi Trans-Frontier Park, where conflict between humans and predators is on the rise.

In the Kgatleng District the hunting of wildlife of all kinds has remained suspended since 1981.

The move towards photographic safaris has divided wildlife conservationists, some of whom argue that hunting quotas issued to the communities that live near wildlife management areas help empower and develop local communities.

Usually the community sells the commercially valuable species such as elephant, zebra, lion and leopard to a private-sector partner. These species have no subsistence use for local people.

Valuable trophy (male) animals such as buffalo, gemsbok, sable, wildebeest and kudu are sold, while the females (meat value) and the lesser antelopes, such as duiker, impala and springbok, are retained for subsistence hunting.

Hunting joint-venture agreements generate large sums of money at community level and substantial employment during the six-month hunting season from April until the end of September.

The tourism industry of Botswana was initially based on trophy hunting and all areas outside the national parks and reserves was divided up into concession areas to be tendered for by professional hunting companies for trophy hunting safaris.

It is widely feared that the ban will allow for an increase in poaching, already widespread in many parts of the country, particularly the Chobe National Park and the Central Kalahari.

"The ban on hunting in Kenya 1976 resulted in 100 000 elephants being poached within a year," said one hunter. According to the Endangered Species Handbook, Botswana earns US$100 million (about P750-million) a year from tourism, including trophy hunting.

In an interview published late last year the "Mmegi" newspaper in Gaborone, top hunter Harry Charalambous, of Maun, called for an increase in the quota for game hunting in the area, saying it attracts billionaires from Europe and America to Botswana.

He said he hosts Russian billionaire and Chelsea Football Club owner, Roman Abromovich, every year for trophy hunting.

Charalambous added he also pays approximately P10-million a year to four community trusts in Chobe, Sankuyo, Mababe, and Okavango from proceeds earned from trophy hunting.

He told the newspaper he was aware that President Ian Khama "is not a fan of trophy hunting and is being lobbied by other interest groups to ban it in favour of photographic safaris."

ibotswana.co.bw