CRBs CRY FOUL OVER RESIDENT HUNTING
THERE will be a scramble in the Game Management Areas (GMAs) in the country’s hunting blocks which will result into unregulated hunting and mass reduction of wildlife for many of the animal species following government decision to commence bonafide and resident hunting, the Zambia Community Resource Boards (ZCRBs) has warned.
Mr George Tembo, the president of the Zambia Community Resource Boards is worried that the Game Management Areas will be congested and that illegal activities in the hunting blocks will escalate following commencement of bonafide and resident hunting.
Mr Tembo said the jump in the increase of licences for resident hunting was too high and that government should have increased the licenses for bonafide hunting because that would have benefited local communities.
He said while the CRBs in the country were not against the resident hunting, there was a danger that the many licences government had issued to individual would encourage illegal activities such as poaching because anti-poaching activities had been halted following the cancellation of the Hunting Concession Agreements by the Ministry of Tourism. Mr Tembo explained that the licences for resident hunting had gone too high and that the hunting season was closing in the next two months would cause a scramble in the GMAs which would in turn escalate poaching activities. “The government has decided to give hunting licenses to Zambians so that they can hunt certain species of animals for meat and personal business.
We are not against that but our worry is that Government has increased resident hunting licences to between 27 and 30 per GMA. That is too high a number and it will cause a scramble in the hunting blocks.
Illegal activities such as poaching will escalate because we no longer have anti-poaching activities. However, we would have proposed that the government increase the number of licences for bonafide hunting because that directly benefit communities. They get the meat and trade within communities,” Mr Tembo said. He said in GMAs where there was no hunting after the cancellation of the HCAs, the population of wildlife had reduced because of poaching activities and that with the resident hunting, there was a danger that hunting blocks could be heavily depleted. On Sunday, Ministry of Tourism Permanent Secretary Evans Muhanga announced the start of this year’s bonafide resident hunting for which he said government had advertised 30 hunting blocks for resident and bonafied hunting comprising 12 prime hunting areas, 13 secondary and four under-stockedand one specialized area.