Abstract
AbstractPoaching of Africa's elephants has led to substantial population declines over the last decade. Local communities coexisting with elephants can play an important role in strengthening protection measures against poaching. Our paper empirically examined how the spread of costs and benefits associated with elephants, and associated ownership rights, influenced community attitudes to support anti‐poaching activities. Based on surveys of 90 community members in the Zimbabwean part of the Kavango Zambezi Transfrontier Conservation Area, our results show that 92% of the respondents were unwilling to engage in conservation activities due to lack of financial gain from elephants. Local communities identified numerous benefits and costs associated with elephants. The majority (54%) of community members identified meat from the elephant as an essential benefit to their livelihoods. The most significant cost identified by the majority (60%) of respondents was crop destruction. The reported costs influenced villagers' perceptions of elephants with 71% of respondents stating that continued incurred costs has reduced their willingness to participate in conservation activities. More so, the majority (88%) of respondents indicated that these costs have led to locals supporting actions to reduce elephant numbers. Furthermore, 82% of respondents indicated a lack of remorse when an elephant was killed after destroying their crops, and 95% of community members identified that feelings of bitterness toward elephants increased as they encountered costs. Our results suggest that gaining local support for elephant conservation to be more sustainable in low income regions, the overall benefits from elephants should outweigh the costs they impose.
Highlights
The escalating poaching of African elephants is one of the continent's foremost conservation challenges (Wittemyer et al, 2014)
This study focused in our research on the perceived benefits and costs of elephants, as these are what drive behavior and actions for or against poaching (Ajzen & Driver, 1992)
There have been limited empirical studies on how the balance between perceived benefits and costs affects community willingness to support anti-poaching activities. We addressed this gap by investigating how the perceived spread of costs and benefits from wildlife affects community willingness to support anti-poaching efforts in Kavango Zambezi Transfrontier Conservation Area (KAZA), using a semistructured survey method
Summary
The escalating poaching of African elephants is one of the continent's foremost conservation challenges (Wittemyer et al, 2014). Local communities are recognized as key actors in assisting and supporting efforts against poaching (Biggs et al, 2017; Cooney et al, 2017) aiming to increase resource-user participation Due to their close proximity to wildlife, local rural communities are potentially essential agents of conservation as they can monitor and report any occurrences of poaching activities (Biggs et al, 2017; Cooney et al, 2017), while utilizing their comprehensive wildlife knowledge and skills to help reduce illegal wildlife trade (Cooney et al, 2018). We addressed this gap by investigating how the perceived spread of costs and benefits from wildlife affects community willingness to support anti-poaching efforts in Kavango Zambezi Transfrontier Conservation Area (KAZA), using a semistructured survey method
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