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There is a porposal to establish a fund of some $400 milliion for wildlife in East Africa.

But will this fund include bans on hunting on wonder, in order for the country to be eligible for hunting?

Is this another threat to our hunting future and sensible conservation?

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Experts Query Viability of $400m Game Fund for EA

The East African
Febrary 24, 2003

John Mbaria, Special Correspondent
Nairobi

Care should be taken so that the fund does not end up interfering with the sovereignty of states over their wildlife resources

A PROPOSED $400 million endowment fund to finance conservation in East Africa has been welcomed by many conservationists, but faces opposition from some who feel it is not justified.

The East African Conservation Endowment Fund, the first of its kind in Africa, is expected to finance shortfalls in the expenditure of conservation organisations in the three East African countries. The institutions are likely to benefit from a projected annual interest of between $20 million and $30 million.

But there are mixed reactions over the justification for the fund. Its supporters say it will help bridge the gap in operational expenditure of the Kenya Wildlife Service (KWS), the Uganda Wildlife Authority (UWA) and Tanzania's Wildlife Division.

Among those who have unreservedly endorsed the idea is the new KWS director, Mr Michael Wamithi, who told participants at a workshop held last week at the Kenya Wildlife Service Institute in Naivasha that KWS urgently needs such financing, since only 10 out of the 56 protected areas under its jurisdiction operate on the income they generate.

The Uganda Wildlife Authority has also supported the fund proposal, but has expressed the need to proceed cautiously. Representing UWA's director, Mr Sam Mwandha, said the decision on who should receive finances from the fund should be left to individual countries' wildlife authorities to decide.

However, Tanzania is not keen on the fund because the country is able to finance most of its conservation activities from licensed hunting proceeds and is afraid that the fund will interfere with its sovereign right to determine how to manage its wildlife resources. Tanzania is the only country in East Africa that pursues a consumptive utilisation of wildlife policy that allows safari hunting.

Tanzania's objection to the fund was confirmed during the Naivasha workshop on East African Wildlife Management, which was organised by the East African Wildlife Society (EAWLS). Tanzania's Wildlife Division deputy director, Mr Juma Kayera, told the workshop participants that care should be taken that the fund did not end up interfering with the sovereignty of states over their wildlife resources. "Such funding must be pegged to existing political relations in East Africa," he said.

Most other participants who supported the fund also felt that it should not end up unduly influencing the conservation agendaa in the region.

The workshop drew participants from KWS, UWA, the World Bank, UNDP, USAid, GTZ, the Maasai Mara National Reserve and the Lewa Wildlife Conservancy. Some of the participants felt that the justifications for setting up the fund were inadequate. "I am disappointed with the justification put forward for the fund. It does not supply a compelling need for a fund of such magnitude," said a UNDP official, Dr Allan Rodgers. He said that the expenditure projections made in the proposal "did not make any sense" and called for a more rigorous analysis of the need for a regional fund, which would be "complicated to manage."

Some conservationists doubt that conservation in East Africa "needs a fund of this magnitude or a radical policy shift."

The sustainability of wildlife, particularly in Kenya, is threatened much more by the retention of "colonial" conservation policies than it is by inadequate finances, said a KWS scientist, who declined to be named, adding that he had expressed reservations over whether the fund would achieve anything meaningful within the current policy framework.

He also said that the conservation policy in Kenya had alienated local communities, leading to threats to wildlife survival.

Other critics have expressed the view that the fund could end up replicating the mistakes made by KWS during the implementation of the Protected Areas and Wildlife Service (PAWS) between 1991 and 1996.

PAWS, which was funded by a coalition of donors - the World Bank, the Netherlands government, Germany and the European Union - is said to have created a costly bureaucratic structure in KWS and a large staff pay anomaly. But Dr Leakey defended PAWS, saying, "It catapulted KWS from inefficiency and ineffectiveness into one of the most successful wildlife bodies in Africa."

On its part, the World Bank has said that the endowment fund should not be used to finance inefficiency. A Bank official, Dr Aggi Kiss, said the fund might "encourage bad behaviour and inefficiency among the beneficiaries."

To avoid this, she said, it needed to be designed in such a way that it encouraged and stimulated greater commitment by East African governments in maintaining existing conservation areas.

Dr Leakey, who chaired the Naivasha workshop, sought to allay such fears, saying: "I do not have any idea of who will constitute the fund's board of trustees."

But he ruled out the involvement of governments in the direct management of the fund, saying it would remain strictly in private hands. "The current global trend is to take the government away from such initiatives," he added.

Dr Leakey, who initiated the idea of the fund over a year ago as the Kenya Biodiversity Trust, said that he brought the EAWS and Uganda and Tanzanian conservation bodies into the picture to give the project a more regional approach.

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John aka NitroX

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Govt get out of our lives NOW!
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