Protected Areas (PAs) such as national parks help conserve wildlife, but nearby communities sometimes suffer when wildlife from PAs attack livestock, raid crops, or spread diseases. Countering these negative human-wildlife... [ view full abstract ]
Protected Areas (PAs) such as national parks help conserve wildlife, but nearby communities sometimes suffer when wildlife from PAs attack livestock, raid crops, or spread diseases. Countering these negative human-wildlife impacts is a range of possible positive interactions for humans, such as fishing, hunting for bush-meat, and wildlife based tourism.
Local support for conservation in PAs can be undermined unless these negative interactions can be reduced, or positive interactions enhanced. This paper examines perceived impacts of wildlife on communities adjacent to Mole National Park, Ghana, through questionnaires administered to 500 randomly selected individuals within 10 communities surrounding the park.
Although 70% of respondents felt positively toward wildlife, perceptions differed among species and communities. Community variability was examined through three factors: participation in a community-based natural resource management program (known in Ghana as Community Resource Management Areas, or “CREMAs”); community distance from the park; and variations in traditional culture.
CREMA communities tended to perceive wildlife impacts less negatively than non-CREMA communities, possibly due to extensive community education and conservation awareness undertaken by the Ghana Wildlife Division staff as part of CREMA development.
Unlike some other studies, perceptions toward wildlife were found to be more positive closer to the park. For example, communities closer to the park suffer more crop depredation by elephants than communities farther away, yet these communities tend to rate elephants less negatively than distant communities. This can be explained by park related tourism value of elephants, contributing to positive economic and social benefits for some villages.
The perception of wildlife impact by traditional affiliation showed some variations. For example, the Mamprusi community rated the impact of elephants more positively than other communities, in part because the Mamprusis have the elephant as their totem and celebrate the “Damba” festival yearly in connection with the totemic animal.
This study illustrates why it is important to understand variability when assessing community support for conservation objectives and devising management interventions.
Topics: Social-Ecological Systems/Coupled Human-Natural Systems , Topics: Human-Wildlife Conflict
