Co-existing with Zambia’s hippo population

06/13/24 • 37 min

In this episode, we travel to Zambia to investigate a different – and lesser known – wildlife conflict to the ones already explored in the series.

The hippo affects many lives, often tragically, and we meet local people with their own stories to tell; both of hippo attacks and injuries caused by elephants in the country.

The Luangwa Valley sees dramatic seasonal variations and with a dynamic river system, fertile soil and lush vegetation, it’s the perfect home for a wide variety of animals – leading to a co-existence situation that delivers both opportunities and challenges for humans living in the area.

In Lupande Game Management Area (GMA), increased human population has led to the expansion of human settlements into protected areas, constricting many species’ ranges and an increase in wildlife populations has resulted in wildlife straying out of protected areas and into crop and livestock areas.

Rodgers Lubilo is a conservation and rural development expert from Zambia. He has 25 years’ experience in community led conservation in Southern Africa - especially in Zambia, Namibia, Botswana, Mozambique and South Africa. He is a champion of community rights to benefit from conservation. He chairs the Zambian CBNRM Forum and the Community Leaders Network of Southern Africa - a leading voice for local communities and indigenous peoples in the region.

We also hear from Goodson, Tinde and Dennis; all of whom have personal, and often tragic, stories of living in conflict with hippos and elephants.

We speak to them all, beneath the baobab.

Visit the website https://jammainternational.com to explore more international projects.

The video of this episode can be seen here: https://youtu.be/DTS1eRjfVi8

https://www.lukusuziriver.com/index.php/zambia-luangwa-en

https://www.researchgate.net/figure/Location-of-Lupande-Game-Management-Area-GMA-in-eastern-Zambia-Adapted-from-17_fig1_263088085

https://www.communityleadersnetwork.org/team_member/rodgers-lubilo/

https://www.cajnewsafrica.com/2023/05/09/zambian-woman-survives-hippo-attack/

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In this episode, we travel to Zambia to investigate a different – and lesser known – wildlife conflict to the ones already explored in the series.

The hippo affects many lives, often tragically, and we meet local people with their own stories to tell; both of hippo attacks and injuries caused by elephants in the country.

We also hear from Goodson, Tinde and Dennis; all of whom have personal, and often tragic, stories of living in conflict with hippos and elephants.

We speak to them all, beneath the baobab.

Visit the website https://jammainternational.com to explore more international projects.

The video of this episode can be seen here: https://youtu.be/DTS1eRjfVi8

https://www.lukusuziriver.com/index.php/zambia-luangwa-en

https://www.researchgate.net/figure/Location-of-Lupande-Game-Management-Area-GMA-in-eastern-Zambia-Adapted-from-17_fig1_263088085

https://www.communityleadersnetwork.org/team_member/rodgers-lubilo/

https://www.cajnewsafrica.com/2023/05/09/zambian-woman-survives-hippo-attack/

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Previous Episode

How agriculture is affected by human wildlife conflict

Kasungu National Park forms part of the trans-frontier conservation area between Malawi and Zambia. The area used to have a thriving wildlife population but due to poaching, it was left depleted with the resident elephant population coming close to extinction.

A translocation plan, put in place by the Malawian government, IFAW and African Parks, has returned the elephants to the park. Despite a positive long-term vision, the short-term effects have resulted in a number of human deaths, animal predation and crop damage – and with the country’s economy being agriculture-focussed, this aspect of human wildlife conflict is a particular concern in Malawi.

Fences are also proving to be a contentious issue. An area being fully-fenced goes against the principles of landscape-scale conservation and prevents free movement but it does provide extra protection to local communities. The tensions are laid bare in this episode.

Malidadi Langa is an economist and retired public servant with extensive experience across decentralisation, rural development, natural resource management governance and public policy – and community based natural resource management, otherwise known as CBNRM. He’s currently Chairman of the Board of Trustees for the KAWICCODA community association, represents Malawi CBNRM associations in the Southern Africa Community Leaders Network, advocating for community rights around sustainable use and benefit sharing.

Senior Chief Lukwe describes a highly populated country in comparison to its neighbours, the need for civic education of the risks from wildlife, and the importance of compensation for victims of human wildlife conflict.

Catherine Chunga is education and extension officer at the Department of Parks and Wildlife, Leonard Moyo is Education Division Manager and Ndaona Kumanga is National Park Manager at Kasungu. They describe Malawi’s unique relationship with wildlife, the challenges the local communities face, and what they are doing in their roles to manage and resolve human wildlife conflict.

We speak to them all, beneath the baobab.

Visit the website https://jammainternational.com to explore more international projects.

The video of this episode can be seen here: https://youtu.be/YCNrvMNfGQ0

Elephant Conservation in the Context of High Human-Wildlife Conflict | African Parks

ifaw's response to elephant tragedies in Malawi

https://www.voanews.com/a/villagers-in-central-malawi-face-attacks-from-elephants-/7280441.html

https://www.malawitourism.com/regions/central-malawi/kasungu-national-park/

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Next Episode

Back Home With Scotland's Beaver Population

In this final episode of the series, presenter Gordon Buchanan heads home to Scotland to see the work that the Beaver Trust is leading to “regenerate the beaver species to regenerate the landscape”.

The Beaver Trust is a charity working to restore animals to habitats where they thrived in the past, building climate resilient landscapes across the UK and we speak to Elliot McCandless from the charity. We also chat to Tom, a fifth-generation farmer on the land but with a very different role to his predecessors.

Our conversations take place, thousands of miles away from the baobab – but with similar ambitions, challenges and conflicts to navigate.

We spoke to both Elliot and Tom alongside the mud banks of a beaver lake, home to the second family of beavers that were brought to Tom’s land in February 2022. Translocation and reintroduction of the species in Scotland brings its own controversies with conservationists, farmers, government and local people holding different perspectives on the beaver population as we’ll explore in this episode.

Whilst this is the last episode of series 2, we will be publishing a special bonus edition of Beneath The Baobab in the coming weeks, bringing together all the key points and fascinating conversations from the last 9 programmes.

So please follow, like or subscribe to make sure you don’t miss it – and leave a written review if you’ve enjoyed the series; it’ll help more people join us in our global conversation, beneath the baobab.

Visit the website https://jammainternational.com to explore more international projects.

The video of this episode can be seen here: https://youtu.be/5FOfzoGgy48

https://beavertrust.org

https://beavertrust.org/nature-boost-in-perthshire-as-second-group-of-beavers-moved-to-argaty/

https://www.nature.scot

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.