Elephant Conservation in Zambezi

In the Zambezi Heartland, one of Africa’s largest elephant populations roams a vast landscape that crosses national boundaries. The Zambezi landscape, which covers three nations (Mozambique, Zambia or Zimbabwe), contains 18,000+ square miles of viable wildlife habitat, anchored by the Mana Pools and Lower Zambezi National Parks. AWF is committed to securing habitat for the landscape’s shared elephant population and mitigating human-elephant conflict.

The elephants of the Zambezi Heartland have always known the land as a single entity. They are not aware of park boundaries, country borders, or human settlements. With funding from the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service and other donor partners, AWF has brought together all stakeholders in the three nations to develop a Heartland-wide management strategy for the elephants.

AWF’s elephant conservation in the Zambezi Heartland began with a research approach. In 2003, AWF achieved an historic landmark—the first coordinated, cross-country aerial survey ever completed in this landscape. The Zambezi Heartland Large Mammal Aerial Survey counted all large herbivores—from aardvark to zebra. A similar joint trans-boundary population census was carried out in 2005.

AWF discovered that the elephant population in the Zambezi Heartland was on the rise. This landscape-level survey encouraged wide-scale cooperation among all three governments on a Regional Elephant Management Plan, and through transboundary law enforcement.

AWF then worked with the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service in 2006 to provide funding to reduce elephant poaching in and around Lower Zambezi National Park in Zambia, coordinating with the ongoing research efforts. The increasing number of elephants led to more human-wildlife conflict and elephant poaching. AWF worked to ensure better resources and equipment to carry out anti-poaching patrols in the park.

We continued to identify key wildlife movement corridors in the Heartland, including sites that could serve as functional dispersal areas for elephant use, away from human settlement – Mutulan'ganga Forest Reserve in Siavonga (28,000 hectares) and Shange Conservancy in Mbire District (16,000 hectares).

Now, AWF’s conservation work in the Zambezi Heartland landscape is focused on securing such additional habitat for elephants and other large herbivores. The area now boasts a 40,000+ elephant herd that roams across the three countries.

Lower Zambezi and Mana Pools National Parks are not fenced. As a result, a growing number of elephants are spending time in nearby open communal areas, such as Siavonga and Mbire districts, increasing the frequency of human-wildlife encounters and conflicts. AWF is dedicated to creating these greater landscapes for the elephants to move, while lessening the burden on local communities.

AWF and local partners have facilitated and completed development of Natural Resources Management Plans for Mbire District in Zimbabwe, and for part of Siavonga District in Zambia. These plans designate zones for wildlife movement corridors, biodiversity conservation/wilderness areas, agriculture and human settlement, tourism development, fishing and non-fishing zones. This is expected to allow landscape-wide elephant movements and reduce human-elephant conflict. In the agriculture zones, AWF has piloted use of chili pepper fences around crop fields to deter elephants from crop raiding.

With AWF’s support, the 30,000 residents in Siavonga and the 78,000 in Mbire District will directly benefit from fewer human-wildlife conflicts, and the elephants will have a safer habitat and landscape to roam.