From segregation to coexistence: finding space for wildlife through local engagement and collaborative conservation

Eastern Africa has retained the richest concentrations of wildlife on earth. In recent decades, conflict has deepened with growing human activity. Resolving the conflict and winning sufficient space to conserve large mammals... [ view full abstract ]

Eastern Africa has retained the richest concentrations of wildlife on earth. In recent decades, conflict has deepened with growing human activity. Resolving the conflict and winning sufficient space to conserve large mammals depends making wildlife beneficial to local communities and building the institutional and management capacity

Policies promoting community-based conservation began in Kenya in the early 1970s. The first steps stemmed from communities protecting the migratory herds of Amboseli National Park in return for payment for ecosystem services and ecotourism ventures on their land. The successes led to national policies to conserve wildlife on an ecosystem-scale through local participation.

In the 1990s Kenya Wildlife Service launched the Parks Beyond Parks campaign to encouraged community wildlife enterprises and wildlife conservancies, bolstered by donor and trust funds to landowner associations and partnering organizations. Beginning with the first community sanctuary in Kimana in 1997, the conservancies have since grown to over 150 countrywide. The conservancies include more wildlife than all parks and reserves combined, and have sharply reduced poaching and conflict. Community scouts, supported by KWS and conservation organizations, have stemmed elephant poaching in Kenya despite the surge in ivory prices.

The success of the conservancies stems from a coalition of landowners, supported by conservation organizations, tour operators and government. The conservancies have built up capacity in business enterprises, security operations and resource monitoring. Lessons learned over the past three decades compiled at a joint meeting of eastern and southern African countries provide a framework of policies, principles and practices for conserving wildlife through collaborative natural resource management.