HWCM - Ministry of Environment and Tourism

National Workshop on Human Wildlife Conflict Management 2005
8 Modification of land use to create or secure elephant movement routes.
Lessons learned
8 Can be encouraged, implemented, monitored and evaluated entirely at the local level
through dialogue and consultation;
8 But only possible in a policy environment with some legitimate, enabled form of local
participation in wildlife management.
10. Building on positive relationships between people and elephants
8 Coexistence of people and elephants in pastoralist societies;
8 Beliefs that elephants are humans and associated taboos concerning the killing of
elephants;
8 Elephants considered as symbols of good luck in some societies (e.g. in Mali);
8 Direction of elephant movements a portent of particular events.
Lessons learned
8 We still know surprisingly little about the human dimension of HEC – local attitudes and
perceptions are central to the issue;
8 Working within local belief systems leads to increased tolerance towards elephants,
thereby reducing HEC;
8 May only be site or society-specific solutions.
11. Conflict Resolution Committees - sharing responsibility for managing HEC
8 Local committees comprised of affected communities, relevant CBOs, NGOs, wildlife
authorities and private sector, etc. who share responsibility for dealing with HEC;
8 Used successfully in Ghana, Guinea and Kenya.
Lessons learned
8 Devolving responsibility to different local stakeholders helps to combat HEC more
effectively;
8 More sustainable in the long-term than relying on local wildlife authority to “take care of
the problem”.
Common fallacies
8 “One size fits all”;
8 The intensity of HEC is directly proportional to the size of the elephant population;
8 Elephants can be easily “trained” to be deterred from crop raiding;
8 The rogue elephant theory;
8 HEC is the government’s problem and can be dealt with effectively by PAC measures
alone;
8 Elephants are the most serious pest species.
So, what can we conclude
8 Coexistence of people and elephants in pastoralist societies;
8 Beliefs that elephants are humans and associated taboos concerning the killing of
elephants;
8 Elephants considered as symbols of good luck in some societies (e.g. in Mali);
8 Direction of elephant movements a portent of particular events.
AfESG’s HEC tools and products:
8 Numerous technical briefs and case studies available in French, English and
Portuguese on AfESG website: www.iucn.org/afesg
8 African Elephant Library has a sub-set 50 of 4,700 abstracted references:
www.elephant.chebucto.ns.ca