Living in an Elephant Landscape

• Published in: American scientist Vol. 106; no. 1; pp. 34 - 41
• Main Authors: Cassidy, Lin, Drake, Michael, Hartter, Joel, Salerno, Jonathan
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Research Triangle Park Sigma XI-The Scientific Research Society 2018
• Subjects: Communities; Community; Conservation; Conservation areas; Corridors; Costs; Decentralization; Elephants; Ethnic factors; Farms; Floodplains; Human populations; Land use; Land use management; Landscape; Leadership; Livestock; Minority & ethnic groups; National parks; Parks & recreation areas; Population growth; Protected areas; Rivers; Tourism; Wilderness; Wildlife; Wildlife conservation; Wildlife management; United States > US; Botswana; Africa
• ISSN: 0003-0996; 1545-2786
• DOI: 10.1511/2018.106.1.34

Salerno et al cite that in July of 2016, a group of farmers and livestock keepers, mostly from the Subiya ethnic group, met with us in their open-walled community hall in Kavimba, a small village in northern Botswana. The community sits on a shifting, narrow strip of land at the edge of a wilderness. Houses and community lands are sandwiched between two protected areas--Chobe National Park and Chobe Forest Reserve--and the floodplain of the coursing Chobe River, within sight of the Namibian border across the wide wetland. The Kavango-Zambezi Transfrontier Conservation Area and its member nations still serve as a positive example of conservation leadership. Current policies include the implementation of spatial landscape management. This strategy attempts to reallocate land use to reduce human-wildlife conflict. Elephant corridors through community lands are identified, and settlements and farms within these zones are relocated. Human population growth and resource demands require that some lands remain strictly protected for wildlife.