Conservation and Management Strategy for the Elephant in Kenya

20 CONSERVATION AND MANAGEMENT STRATEGY FOR THE ELEPHANT IN KENYA
2. The strategic document
BACKGROUND
During the period 1991–1996, the priority for elephant conservation was to establish firmly the protection of
elephants following the devastation of their numbers during the previous two decades, and to initiate efforts to
secure elephant range through improved relations with local communities who shared their habitat.
The subsequent period, to the present day, has been one of consolidation, albeit with a series of changes in KWS
management, and more recently a period of stability, with renewal in 2005 of KWS administrative structures. The
protection of elephants from illegal hunting for ivory since the early 1990s has been largely successful, and numbers
have increased from about 20,000 in 1990 (Joyce Poole, pers. comm., 2010) to over 35,000 today (Table 2). Efforts
that were initiated to maintain elephant range through the control of conflict have also made progress within their
specific terms of approach. Barriers were built under a support programme funded by the European Union (EU) and
engagement with communities has been established. A number of programmes have been developed in
collaborative partnerships between KWS and NGOs and CBOs. However, land use planning has not been advanced
and habitat fragmentation has accelerated in areas, particularly in the vicinity of Laikipia, Amboseli, Narok and
Trans-Mara resulting in increased HEC. Certain populations that had been identified as at risk from land use
conversion – Shimba Hills, Arabuko Sokoke, Mwea – have now been encircled and enclosed, increasing the urgency
of interventive management to control local density and habitat impacts. For management of habitat impacts, the
action of choice in the 1991–1996 KWS Policy Framework and Development Programme was contraception, which
was not effective in early trials and is currently only viable in discrete, closely monitored and constrained populations
(e.g. captive environments such as zoos). This requires further testing to determine its usefulness before
considering implementation on a wider scale. Instead, translocation methods have been successfully developed and
refined, involving the movement of elephants from a number of locations including Mwea and Shimba Hills, both to
Tsavo East and from Laikipia to Meru, and internal relocations from sanctuaries such as Ngulia Sanctuary to the
larger PAs.
The 1991–1996 KWS Policy Framework and Development Programme contained the first strategic plan targeted at
elephant management in Kenya and it has remained the only such plan from 1990 to present. While it was
ground-breaking in identifying priorities and strategies, and it initiated very positive actions, it did not set
measurable targets and, thus, progress cannot be assessed. Policies for elephant management today remain
unchanged even in the revised draft Wildlife Policy.
[ RIGHT ] Plate 20.
Adult female and calves at Tsavo East
National Park. Apprehensive of human
presence probably due to past poaching
experiences - Charles Ooro, Kenya Wildlife
Service