Botswana overturns ban on hunting of elephants
Botswana on Wednesday announced the lifting of its ban on elephant hunting, attributing its decision to an apparent rise in “humanelephant conflict” caused by rising elephant numbers. Conservationists, however, criticized the move as not being grounded in science and said it could have negative effects on Botswana’s thriving wildlife-driven tourism industry.
Botswana is home to the world’s largest elephant population, with about 130,000 living in the southern African country, according to conservationists. After diamonds, tourism is Botswana’s biggest foreignincome earner.
The government banned hunting elephants in 2014 at the direction of then-President Ian Khama, a staunch conservationist. But the ban has been controversial in Botswana, where advocates for lifting the ban say the growing number of elephants has affected locals’ livelihoods.
When Mokgweetsi E.K. Masisi became president last year, he set up a committee to assess whether the ban should be overturned.
Masisi also ended Botswana’s “shoot to kill” anti-poaching policy, which allowed the military to kill suspected poachers.
Botswana’s Ministry of Environment, Natural Resources Conservation and Tourism said the committee determined that with the hunting suspension in place, “humanelephant conflict and the consequent impact on livelihoods was increasing.”
The committee’s “general consensus from those consulted was that the hunting ban should be lifted,” the ministry said.
Botswana’s parliamentary elections are set to take place in October, and the hunting ban has become a campaign issue, particularly in rural areas where the elephant populations are more prominent.
Last year, lawmaker Konstantinos Markus told Reuters that constituents in his home region have been harmed by the ban. The growing elephant population meant the animals increasingly were coming into contact with farms, he said, where they trampled crops and harmed locals’ income.
“This harvest loss leaves the community with fewer options to take care of their households while perceptions of local communities toward wildlife conservation have changed since the hunting ban,” he told the news agency.
Masisi has stirred some controversy over his approach. This month, when leaders from Zimbabwe, Zambia and Namibia visited Botswana, Masisi gifted them stools made out of elephant feet.
Wildlife conservationists have expressed alarm at Masisi’s lifting of the hunting ban.
“The new arguments for hunting are all wrong — population control, decrease in human-elephant conflict, lots of money for local communities. What facts are those based in?” asked Mike Chase, director of Elephants Without Borders, a charity based in Botswana that does scientific research on local elephant populations.