HWCM - Ministry of Environment and Tourism

National Workshop on Human Wildlife Conflict Management 2005
2. Key Issues for Developing Self-Insurance Scheme Policy
(Facilitator: Dr M Lindeque and Fanuel Demas)
Key Issues
Objectives of the
scheme
Guiding principles
Key Concerns for
policy
List of approaches
• Balance individual losses with collective gain;
• Increase threshold of tolerance to wildlife;
• Motivate better management—create an incentive
• Policy can provide guidance, but rules must be decided by
specific communities, for example:
• Time period by which one must submit a claim
• What will be covered
• Focus on legal entities that have the capacity to pay out and earn
an income from wildlife, i.e. conservancies
• Based upon a well-researched understanding of the financial level
of loss.
• What should be covered and where is the benchmark
• How do we assess benchmark
• What are the principles
Affordability;
De-linking from market value.
• Who should be covered
• Members
• All residents
• Neighbours
• Financial mechanisms
• Management;
• Level of financing;
• Source of funding;
• Capital and process vs. recurrent costs, reinsurance.
• Who are the culprits
• What wildlife species
Elephants, lions, etc
• What value do those animals have for the revenue creation,
biodiversity, etc
How will this impact upon who the culprits are
• Legal issues
• How will payment be made out
• Must be clear about not distorting the process as a result of
external funding.
Discussion
Diggle added that the group had also discussed the situation of a conservancy as a legal body making a
payment – are they taking ownership over the animals The PS raised the issue of whether payments
should be made in cash or in kind, and the group felt that for livestock, cash payments should be made,
while for crops, there was more potential for replacing lost cereals or produce. Jo summarised discussions
by saying that essentially people have accepted responsibility and have organised themselves at
institutional level to deal and negotiate with Government to accept rights and responsibilities. The point was
raised as to where money was going to come from to pay compensation and who would verify claims in
areas where there were no conservancies. The PS responded by saying that people had the opportunity to
organise themselves into conservancies that are institutions that could operate self-insurance schemes.
59