Conservation and the Environment in Namibia 2022

PUBLISHING EDITORS

Elzanne McCulloch elzanne@venture.com.na Gail Thomson gailsfelines@gmail.com

PRODUCTION MANAGER

Liza de Klerk liza@venture.com.na LAYOUT Fiona Nandago fiona@venture.com.na CUSTOMER SERVICE

bonn@venture.com.na

PRINTERS

The editorial content of Conservation and the Environment in Namibia is contributed by the Namibia Chamber of Environment, freelance journalists, employees of the Namibian Ministry of Environment, Forestry and Tourism (MEFT) and NGOs. It does not necessarily reflect the opinions or policies held by MEFT or the publisher. No part of the magazine may be reproduced without written permission from the publisher.

ABOUT VENTURE Media

SHARING STORIES THAT MATTER.

That’s our mantra at Venture Media. Sharing stories, information and inspiration to an audience that understand and value why certain things matter. Why conservation, tourism, people & communities, businesses and ethics matter.

S H A R E Y O U R S T O R Y W I T H U S I N

How these elements interrelate and how we can bring about change, contribute to the world and support each other. Whether for an entire nation, an industry, a community, or even just an individual.

We find, explore, discover, teach, showcase and share stories that matter.

www.venture.com.na or email us at info@venture.com.na for a curated proposal.

T E L L , G R O W

from the PUBLISHER

We live in an interesting world during interesting times. A world where stories are shared far and wide, which sometimes is good and sometimes… not so much. In a recent conversation with Namibian conservationist and researcher John Mendelsohn I again realised the importance of sharing stories to an audience that appreciates them and understands why they matter. Yes, a TikTok video of a guy riding on a rhino in Namibia may get more views, but it is the antithesis of what we as Namibians, as conservationists and proponents of our country and its natural treasures, wish to achieve. We want to share the stories that matter with an audience that understands and appreciates the hows and whys

That is why it is such a pleasure and honour to be part of a publication such as this. A collection of stories written by authors, researchers, scientists and conservationists who stay true to the importance of conservation in Namibia and the reasons why our successes, as well as our shortcomings, are an integral part of our nation’s story and should be shared. So that others may learn from us and learn with us.

The pages of our 2022 edition of Conservation and the Environment in Namibia are packed with stories that matter We delve into our country’s tremendous successes in the fight against wildlife crime and the important role that partnerships and collaboration have played in it. Beyond the groundwork (which is tremendous), to preemptive arrests and successful persecution. As Helge Denker aptly points out: “In Namibia, wildlife crime clearly

doesn’t pay.” We follow Kelsey Prediger, our resident Pangolin Pro , as she continues her research on the world’s most trafficked mammal and on how to increase the efficacy of releasing liveconfiscated pangolins back into the wild. We get to know a group of young wildlife vets as they learn on the job and we discover more about carnivore conservation in Namibia, why tourism and conservation go hand in hand, how to be a Citizen Scientist and how to help diminish the scourge of invasive plant species. John Mendelsohn and his team also tackle the by now infamous Fairy Circle debacle.

We learn, we appreciate, we celebrate. Namibia is a country like few others, with conservation and environmental policies that have set us up for success. Our president has reaffirmed these commitments at COP27 and we look towards a future where our continued work, perseverance and commitment to our environment will enable us to remain a benchmark for protection of natural resources, wealth and heritage. A beacon of hope that others can strive to emulate.

So thank you to the writers for sharing your stories, and to the readers who appreciate them and understand why they matter.

Elzanne McCulloch

Le Roux van Schalkwyk

Elzanne McCulloch

ABOUT NAMIBIAN CHAMBER OF ENVIRONMENT

The Namibian Chamber of Environment (NCE) is a membership-based and -driven umbrella organisation established as a voluntary association under Namibian Common Law to support and promote the interests of the environmental NGO sector and its work. The Members constitute the Council – the highest decision-making organ of the NCE. The Council elects Members to the Executive Committee at an AGM to oversee and give strategic direction to the work of the NCE Secretariat. The Secretariat (staff) of the NCE comprise a CEO and Office Manager. Only the Office Manager is employed full-time. The NCE currently has 57 Full Members – Namibian registered NGOs whose main business, or a significant portion of whose business, comprises involvement in and promotion of environmental matters in Namibia; and 13 Associate Members – individuals running environmental programmes and non-Namibian NGOs likewise involved in local to national environmental matters in Namibia. A list of Members follows. For more information on each Member, their contact details and website link, please go to the NCE website at www.n-c-e.org/members

THE NCE HAS FOUR ASPIRATIONAL OBJECTIVES AND FIVE OPERATIONAL OBJECTIVES AS FOLLOWS:

Aspirational Objectives

• Conserve the natural environment

• Protect indigenous biodiversity & endangered species

• Promote best environmental practices

• Support efforts to prevent & reduce environmental degradation & pollution

Operational Objectives

• Represent the environmental interests of Members

• Act as a consultative forum for Members

• Engage with policy- & lawmakers to improve environmental policy & its

• implementation

• Build environmental skills in young Namibians

• Support & advise Members on environmental matters & facilitate access to

• environmental information

The NCE espouses the following key values:

• To uphold the fundamental rights and freedoms entrenched in Namibia’s Constitution and laws, including the principles of sustainable use, protection of biodiversity and inter-generational equity;

• To promote compliance with, uphold and share, environmental best practice, recognising that the Earth’s resources are finite, and that human health and wellbeing are inextricably linked to environmental health.

• To recognise that environmental best practice is best promoted by implementing the following seven principles: sustainability, polluter pays, precautionary, equity, effectiveness & efficiency, human rights and participation;

• To develop skills, expertise and passion in young Namibians on environmental issues;

• To ensure political and ideological neutrality, be evidence-based and counter fake information; and

• To promote inclusiveness and to fiercely and fearlessly reject any form of discrimination.

AREAS:

1. Support to Members

The NCE provides office facilities, boardroom, internet and safe parking for its out-of-town Members when in Windhoek; in partnership with Westair, a Cessna 182 for conservation purposes such as aerial surveys, radio-tracking and anti-poaching work; three 4x4 Toyota Hilux double-cab vehicles for use by Members for their conservation work; registration and research permit facilitation; and any other support requested by Members.

2. National facilitation

The NCE organises symposia and workshops on topical and priority issues; supports the development of strategic Best Practice Guides at sector level, the first on mining, the second (in preparation) on hunting; reviews policy and legislation on and/or impacting Namibia’s environment; facilitates collaboration on conservation assessments and action plans, the latest being Namibia’s Carnivore Red Data Book; and representing the sector and Members on national bodies.

3. Environmental information

The NCE hosts and supports the development of Namibia’s Environmental Information Service (EIS at www.the-eis.com) in partnership with Paratus Telecom, a one-stop-shop for all environmental information on Namibia. The EIS comprises an e-library with over 18,000 reports, publications, maps, data sets, theses, etc., which are searchable and down-loadable. It provides an Atlasing platform for citizen science data collection that currently covers mammals, reptiles, amphibians, butterflies, invasive alien plants and archaeology, and records are conveniently entered via a free cell phone App. The NCE has also established a free, open access scientific e-journal –Namibian Journal of Environment – now in its sixth year (www.nje.org.na). The NCE and Venture Media recently launched a new environmental website “Conservation Namibia” (www.conservationnamibia.com) to tell Namibia’s conservation stories via blogs, factsheets, video and articles from this magazine. The NCE informs the public on topical environmental issues on its website (www.n-c-e.org), Facebook page and Twitter feed.

4. Environmental advocacy

The NCE addresses national threats to Namibia’s environment and natural resources by first attempting to work constructively with the relevant government or other entity but, if necessary, through public exposure. The NCE has addressed the issue of Chinese incentivised poaching and illegal trade in specially protected wildlife, the over-fishing of pilchards in Namibian waters, illegal and unsustainable timber harvesting and export, and the need to reduce and eliminate single-use plastic from Namibia’s environment. It has also initiated a highly successful Pangolin reward scheme in partnership with MEFT, some NCE Members and communities. The scheme rewards people for providing information on pangolin trafficking leading to arrests – more than 120 criminal cases opened and over 200 people arrested and charged.

5. Environmental policy research

When we talk about the “environment” we mean the interrelationship of ecological, social and economic aspects – essentially sustainable development. This is appropriate for a country with an economy reliant mainly on natural resource-based primary production where ecological and socio-economic issues are two sides of the same coin. However, this conceptual approach is rarely understood by people from western industrialised countries who think of environment as being just the green environment. To get around this problem, the NCE has established a socio-economic / livelihoods component that works seamlessly with the environmental component and focusses mainly on the urban environment. Over 50% of Namibians now live in towns and the city of Windhoek, with a projected rise to 70% by 2030. The priority areas

TO EFFECTIVELY IMPLEMENT THESE OBJECTIVES AND VALUES, THE NCE HAS DEVELOPED EIGHT STRATEGIC PROGRAMME

Elzanne McCulloch

of focus are access to affordable urban land for housing, appropriate sanitation, solid waste management, energy and research on the economics of poverty.

6. Young Namibian training and mentorship

Over the past five academic years the NCE in partnership with Woodtiger Fund has provided 140 post-graduate bursaries in the broad environmental field (including subjects such as environmental economics, environmental law, environmental engineering) and 41 internships, mainly for NCE bursary-holders, that involves close mentoring by experienced environmental professionals. The aim is to build the capacity and confidence of young Namibians to become the environmental leaders of tomorrow.

7. Fund raising

Core funding for the NCE is currently provided by B2Gold. This means that all additional funding received is invested directly into

MEMBERS

FULL MEMBERS

A. Speiser Environmental Consultants cc

African Conservation Services cc

Africat Foundation

Agra Provision (Agra Ltd)

Ashby Associates cc

Biodiversity Research Centre, NUST (BRC-NUST)

Botanical Society of Namibia

Brown Hyena Research Project Trust Fund

Cheetah Conservation Fund (CCF)

Conservancy Association of Namibia (CANAM)

Desert Lion Conservation Trust

Development Workshop Namibia (DW-N)

Earthlife Namibia Eco Awards Namibia

Eco-logic Environmental Management Consultancy cc EduVentures

Elephant Human Relations Aid (EHRA)

Environmental Assessment Professionals Association of Namibia (EAPAN)

Environmental Compliance Consulting (ECC) EnviroScience

Felines Communication and Conservation Consultants cc

Giraffe Conservation Foundation (GCF)

Gobabeb Research & Training Centre

Greenspace

Integrated Rural Development & Nature Conservation (IRDNC)

JARO Consultancy

Kwando Carnivore Project

LM Environmental Consultants

N/a’an ku sê Foundation

Namib Desert Environmental Education Trust (NaDEET)

Namibia Biomass Industry Group (N-BiG)

Namibia Bird Club

Namibia Nature Foundation (NNF)

Namibia Professional Hunting Association (NAPHA)

Namibia Scientific Society

Namibian Association of CBNRM Support Organisations (NACSO)

environmental projects and programmes – there are no overhead costs. The NCE focuses on corporate support and avoids targeting funding sources that may compete with its Members. The corporate sector assists with fund raising by approaching their clients, partners and networks. Our main sponsors are shown on the back cover.

8. Grants making

Funds raised by the NCE are used strategically to support priority environmental projects and programmes in Namibia. Emphasis is placed on legacy initiatives that have tangible outcomes. These are often based on national policy and bring together government and NGO partners, communities and the private sector, and frequently lead to investments by larger bilateral or multi-lateral funding organisations. An on-line grant application process allows NCE Members to apply for funding. To date 166 grants have been awarded, to the value of N$ 22.304 million, with 90% going to NCE Members. Some of these projects are showcased in this magazine.

Namibian Environment & Wildlife Society (NEWS)

Namibian Hydrogeological Association

NamibRand Nature Reserve Nyae Nyae Development Foundation of Namibia (NNDFN)

Oana Flora and Flora Omba Arts Trust

Ongava Game Reserve / Research Centre Otjikoto Trust Progress Namibia TAS cc Rare & Endangered Species Trust (REST) Research & Information Services of Namibia (RAISON) Rooikat Trust

Save The Rhino Trust (SRT) Scientific Society Swakopmund Seeis Conservancy SLR Environmental Consulting Southern African Institute of Environmental Assessment (SAIEA) SunCycles Namibia Sustainable Solutions Trust Tourism Supporting Conservation Trust (TOSCO) Venture Media

ASSOCIATE MEMBERS

Bell, Maria A

Black-footed Cat Research Project Namibia Bockmühl, Frank

Desert Elephant Conservation Irish, Dr John Kolberg, Herta

Leibniz Institute for Zoo & Wildlife Research Lukubwe, Dr Michael S

Namibia Animal Rehabilitation, Research & Education Centre (NARREC)

Seabirds & Marine Ecosystems Programme Sea Search Research and Conservation (Namibia Dolphin Project) Strohbach, Dr Ben Wild Bird Rescue

Foreword

While it may take a village to raise a child, it takes a whole nation to conserve its natural environment. Many of the stories in this year’s magazine reach out beyond research and show how Namibians from all walks of life are getting involved in conservation.

You can join the growing number of citizen scientists by using a cell phone application to record animal and plant sightings. Turn to page 78 to find out how to download the Namibian Atlasing app and get started collecting information on a wide range of species. Technology is also a great way to get young people interested in the natural world, and was thus an important part of this year’s Earth Day event under the theme Shape Our Future (page 70). The young adults who participated in this event were inspired to collect biodiversity data and host their own conservation-related events in their communal conservancies.

Once we know more about the state of the environment through data collection, we need to communicate it in a way that is both useful and engaging. Two brand new Atlases, presented on page 62, achieve this goal with hundreds of maps, charts, photos alongside informative text (for adults) and hand-drawn illustrations with simple explanations (for children). Another publication produced this year focuses on the 34 terrestrial carnivores of Namibia. It describes what we currently know about these species, what research gaps still need to be filled, and what we must do to ensure their long-term survival (page 28).

Lions are among the most difficult carnivores to live with, yet their survival in arid north-western Namibia relies on coexistence with local communities. The Lion Rangers programme (page 58) is one of many initiatives to conserve desert-adapted lions within the context of communitybased natural resource management. In a similar vein, Tourism Supporting Conservation (TOSCO, page 52) celebrates their first decade of existence, during which time they created closer links between the tourism sector and communal conservancies.

Conservation will ultimately succeed or fail to the extent that people understand environmental issues and are inspired to act. The Let Every Scale Count initiative (page 48) that links creative writing, art and pangolin conservation is a great example of how to raise public awareness about a serious problem – pangolin poaching and trafficking. Some of the stories written by children from all over Namibia (page 50) take a heart-breaking pangolin-eye view of being caught and trafficked alive. Rescuing live pangolins and releasing them into the wild is just part of the story, however, and new research (page 16) reveals that released individuals could be killed by other pangolins soon after release. Solving this problem demands a better understanding of pangolin habitat requirements and existing territories.

Beyond awareness and research, we need to prevent poaching whenever possible and pass strict sentences for wildlife crimes to deter future poachers. Namibia has launched a multi-pronged effort to tackle this challenge – increasing on-the-ground patrols, upgrading security in the national parks, improving investigations and prosecutions, and finally handing down stricter sentences in the courts (read all about it on page 12 and 42).

Two other less well-known, but nonetheless serious environmental problems in Namibia are presented here with calls for public participation and help. In The battle against invasive alien species in Namibia (page 64) members of the newly established Invasive Alien Working Group describe past and current efforts to remove alien plant species that are reducing groundwater and displacing indigenous species. The second threat is even more insidious, since most of us do not think about birds being killed on power lines that deliver electricity to our homes. Big birds, big power lines, big problems (page 74) calls attention to the problem and explores some potential solutions – including reducing our reliance on imported electricity.

For a good news story, turn to page 22 to read about Namibia’s first ever specialist wildlife veterinary medicine course that included eight young veterinarians from Namibia and four other African countries. To tickle your curiosity, read About fairies of all sizes (page 34): going beyond the famous ‘fairy circles’ of the Namib to investigate other strangely circular natural phenomena in Namibia and Angola.

Conservation is everybody’s business. We are jointly responsible for leaving our environment in a better state than we found it. We hope that this edition of Conservation and the Environment in Namibia will inspire you to get involved in Namibian nature conservation. From collecting data on your phone to removing invasive alien plants in your neighbourhood, or simply using less electricity from the national grid – everyone can do something. Children, young adults, artists, scientists, rural community members, and dedicated senior citizens all feature in this year’s magazine as contributing to conservation in some way. You can too.

Yours in conservation

Chris Brown and Gail Thomson

Elzanne McCulloch

Conservation is the preservation of life on earth, and that, above all else, is worth fighting for.

Elzanne McCulloch

- Rob Stewart

From the Publisher 1 About Venture Media 2 About NCE 3 Foreword 6

Powerful deterrents against wildlife crime 12 Helge Denker

Trafficked pangolins get a second chance, but do they survive? 16 Kelsey Prediger

Taking African wildlife veterinary medicine to new heights 22 Giraffe Conservation Foundation and University of Namibia

The next steps for carnivore conservation in Namibia 28 NCE, LCMAN, and MEFT

About fairies of all sizes 34 John Mendelsohn, Elizabeth Shangano and Fillemon Shatipamba

Namibia is taking the fight to poachers and traffickers 42 WWF-Namibia

Let every scale count – Using creativity for pangolin conservation 48 Liz Komen

Bridging the gap between tourism and conservation: A decade of dreams, challenges and achievements 52 Lara Potma

Seeing lions in a different light – Lion Rangers and community conservation 58 John Heydinger

Getting to know Namibia with two beautiful new Atlases 62 Gail Thomson

The battle against invasive alien species in Namibia 64 Shirley Bethune, Petra Mutota, Lucrensia Ndeilitunga

Namibian Youth in Conservation are ready to Shape Our Future 70 Siphiwe Lutibezi and Ingelore Katjingisiua

Big birds, big power lines, big problems 74 John Pallett

Citizen science in Namibia 78 Alice Jarvis

NCE Supports 80

POWERFUL DETERRENTS AGAINST WILDLIFE CRIME

By Helge Denker

Temminck’s pangolin is the most-trafficked high-value species in Namibia - and pangolins are generally the most-trafficked wild animals worldwide. The animals are often trafficked alive and when seized from perpetrators can be released back into the wild. Vehicles used to transport illegal wildlife products are seized as instrumentalities and forfeited to the State – a painful additional punishment.

Environmental crime has exploded worldwide in recent years. According to a report by INTERPOL and UNEP 1 , environmental crime has increased at 2 to 3 times the rate of the global economy and is now the fourth-largest criminal sector after drug trafficking, counterfeit crimes and human trafficking. It is a massive problem, receiving massive attention. Similar trends are true for Namibia. Over the past decade, cases have skyrocketed from negligible to crisis levels –but over the past five years crime rates have been curbed through increasingly effective law enforcement.

Yet, catching criminals is only half the work. What happens to the arrested perpetrators? And what will deter environmental crime in the long run? Namibia may be finding at least some of the answers.

When independent Namibia was first confronted with modern, organised wildlife crime, the country was not prepared for the onslaught. After experiencing negligible losses while achieving significant conservation successes for more than 20 years, things changed rapidly and poignantly after 2010. Rhinos and elephants were particularly hard-hit, reaching a peak of 97 rhinos poached in 2015 and 101 elephants in 2016. Goaded by public outrage, including demonstrations in the streets, Namibia moved rapidly to counter the crisis.

National security forces were deployed to priority elephant and rhino ranges to help protect the animals. Maximum allowable penalties for wildlife crimes were substantially increased. New government departments were created, dedicated to wildlife protection and the investigation and prosecution of environmental crimes. The Ministry of Environment, Forestry and Tourism created a Wildlife Protection Services Division (MEFT, WPSD). The Office of the Prosecutor General launched an Environmental Crime Unit (OPG, ECU). Inter-agency cooperation between conservation, law enforcement and prosecution was strengthened with a law-enforcement focal point called the Blue Rhino Task Team, headed by the Namibian Police Force’s Protected Resources Division (NAMPOL–PRD) and the MEFT Intelligence and Investigation Unit (MEFT–IIU).

All of these interventions, facilitated through active support from international and local funding partners, helped to stem the tide of wildlife crime. Wide-ranging partnerships proved particularly important, as the government, non-governmental organisations, local communities and the private sector worked together to counter all forms of environmental crime. Losses of rhinos have been curbed appreciably and elephant poaching has been reduced to negligible levels (though the ivory from elephants poached in neighbouring countries continues to be seized in Namibia).

Suspects arrested attempting to sell ivory to undercover investigators. The high number of cases and arrests resulting from the sudden spike in wildlife crime has led to a significant backlog in wildlife cases on the court roll.

The graph shows the decline in losses of elephant (purple bars) and rhino (pink bars) to poaching, compared to the increase in registered cases with arrests and seizures; green indicates all types of wildlife cases; red indicates high-value species cases (elephant, rhino, pangolin); black indicates meat-poaching cases (giraffe, buffalo, zebra, antelope, warthog).

For a time, meat poaching continued to increase, reaching a peak of 263 cases in 2019. This, too, has since been curbed by 30 per cent. Overall, registered wildlife crime cases have been reduced by one quarter over the past two years. Pangolin trafficking nonetheless remains one of the biggest current concerns, as little is known about the overall population status of Namibia’s pangolins, while trafficking has increased in step with international trends2. Numerous traffickers are being caught and live pangolins are being released back into the wild, but the drivers of the Namibian trade are poorly understood.

Effective law enforcement against an active criminal sector results in high numbers of arrests. Since 2015, more than 4,200 suspects have been arrested for various wildlife crimes in Namibia.

The rapid rise in the number of arrests and subsequent court cases has presented a new challenge, overwhelming an already stretched judiciary. Namibia already grappled with high rates of crime in other spheres, including homicide, domestic violence, fraud and corruption, burglary and armed robbery. The sudden massive expansion of the environmental crime sector resulted in a growing backlog of court cases, and the prosecution of suspects has lagged further and further behind arrests. This was not solely an issue of slow prosecution and case finalisation, however. Investigators, feeling they had achieved their goal of catching the criminals, often did not follow through effectively with further investigations and the finalisation of case dockets to ensure that these were trial-ready.

The Prosecutor General, Adv. Olyvia Imalwa, became increasingly concerned by these trends. The newly created Environmental Crime Unit was activated at the beginning of 2021 to whittle away at the backlog. The first step was to ensure that case dockets were trial-ready. The Head of the ECU, Adv. Jatiel Mudamburi, and his Deputy, Adv. Johannes Kalipi, conducted a thorough docket cleanup campaign, visiting nine Namibian towns to screen dockets and prepare them for trial.

The next step was to find a way to reduce the number of cases on the court roll in the various magisterial districts. It was decided that a Special Court would be needed to focus only on wildlife cases for an entire month. Based on wildlife crime prevalence, Katima Mulilo and Rundu were chosen as the priority candidates for the initiative.

Funding support was secured from the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime, Space for Giants, TRAFFIC and Rooikat Trust. Prosecution teams were selected and dispatched, court space was secured, and on 1 April 2022 hearings began in both towns. The two teams worked tirelessly, far beyond official working hours and mandated court days, to prepare for each week’s court sessions and ensure that court delays were minimised.

Elephant tusks seized from a Zambian national who was attempting to sell the ivory in Namibia. Most of the ivory seized in Namibia originates from elephants poached in other countries. The finalised case resulted in a sentence of 126 months (10.5 years) in prison for the perpetrator

Team Katima Mulilo (from left to right): Mr Barry Buiswalelo Mufana – Magistrate; Ms Mildred Masiliso Ausiku – Clerk of Court; Ms Raonga Uanivi – Prosecutor; Ms Portia Kachana Mubonenwa – Interpreter; Sgt Muyambango – NAMPOL Court Orderly; Adv Johannes Mwatondandje Kalipi (ECU Deputy) –Supervisor; Mr Nabot Tangeni Charly Iyambo (ECU Member) – Prosecutor

Team Rundu (from left to right): Mr Peingondjambi Shipo – Magistrate; Marchell Hoeb (ECU Member) – Prosecutor; Ms Rovisa Marengi –Interpreter; Mrs Adrie Rickets (ECU Member) – Prosecutor; Const Muruti –NAMPOL Court Orderly; Adv Jatiel Mudamburi (ECU Head) – Supervisor; not present Ms Maria Ruben – Clerk of Court.

The operation entailed complex logistics, such as the transportation of accused to and from the courtrooms, ensuring the availability of witnesses and coordinating legal representation, among much else. Logistical challenges were overcome through active collaboration among regional NAMPOL and MEFT personnel and the prosecution teams, with support from Rooikat, Blue Rhino, the Directorate of Legal Aid within the Ministry of Justice, and the Law Society of Namibia. Highly committed interpreters, clerks of the court and court orderlies facilitated the daily court sessions.

The results produced by the end of April were tremendous. Cases were rapidly concluded throughout the month, with stern sentences being served. Noteworthy penalties include 9 years direct imprisonment for pangolin trafficking, a fine of N$ 800,000 or 8 years imprisonment for ivory trafficking, and 12 years direct imprisonment (with 3 years suspended) for ivory trafficking. Charges in these cases included transgressions against the Prevention of Organised Crime Act. A number of noteworthy penalties of up to 5 years in prison were also handed down in meat-poaching cases. These sentences serve as a powerful deterrent.

In addition, the vehicles and firearms used to commit the crimes were forfeited to the State along with the confiscated wildlife products. The loss of expensive four-wheel-drives or flashy sedans is a painful additional penalty for convicted criminals. A total of 5 cars and 16 firearms were forfeited in the course of the month. Between the two courts, 80 cases were finalised; 68 of these as convictions (a conviction

rate of 85 per cent). The achievements of one month compare very favourably with the results of entire past years.

In Namibia, wildlife crime clearly does not pay. The chances of being caught are high. Through effective investigations and law enforcement, numerous poachers are being caught – many even before they manage to kill an animal. Rapid investigations following a poaching incident are resulting in high success rates in solving cases. Ongoing investigations into old cases continue to lead to more arrests – and convictions. Wildlife crime cases are now receiving priority attention from the judiciary. The dedicated efforts of the Office of the Prosecutor General, in close collaboration with investigators, are ensuring that arrests lead to convictions. Offenders are facing justice, and that includes stern sentences.

Namibia has worked hard to ensure healthy wildlife numbers, in many cases rebuilding the populations of vulnerable species from historic lows. This has enabled the tourism and conservation hunting industries – both based on abundant wildlife, intact ecosystems and sound conservation structures – to become two of the most important economic sectors in the country. The Namibian conservation, law enforcement and judiciary spheres are now working equally hard to ensure that those gains are not eroded by the greed of selfish criminals. Together, Namibia’s collaborative efforts, bolstered by ongoing support from the international community, are creating a powerful deterrent against wildlife crime.

Notes

1

2

Nellemann, C. et al. 2016. The Rise of Environmental Crime – A Growing Threat To Natural Resources, Peace, Development And Security. A UNEP-INTERPOL Rapid Response Assessment, p. 4. United Nations Environmental Programme and RHIPTO Rapid Response – Norwegian Centrer for Global Analyses.

United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime. 2020. World Wildlife Crime Report 2020: Trafficking in Protected Species, p. 66. UNODC, Vienna.

First GPS/SAT tagged pangolin in Etosha National Park

Kelsey Prediger, Pangolin Conservation and Research Foundation)

TRAFFICKED PANGOLINS GET A SECOND CHANCE,

BUT DO THEY SURVIVE?

By Kelsey Prediger, Pangolin Conservation and Research Foundation

In recent years, pangolins have become the most trafficked animal in Namibia. According to national wildlife crime reports, 491 pangolins (152 live and 339 carcasses or skins) were confiscated and 640 arrests were made in the last seven years (2015-2021, MEFT statistics).

Pangolins are poached for their scales, body parts, and meat for traditional beliefs, medicine and food worldwide. In recent years there is rising pressure on the species primarily due to their scales being used in Traditional Chinese Medicine. For nearly 80 million years their scales have protected them against predation. Now it is a reason for which they are killed.

About 30% of the poached pangolins were still alive when their traffickers were caught. These pangolins are often weak and medically compromised, as they have been held in captivity for days or weeks without any food or water. Pangolins only eat live ants and termites in their natural habitat, which makes them hard to cater for even after they are confiscated. After a quick health check and treatment by a veterinarian approved by the Namibian Pangolin Working Group (NPWG), the animals are released. What we don’t yet know is how long these pangolins survive after their release.

Why are releases not always successful?

There are several reasons why releasing pangolins is a challenging task. Firstly, we do not understand where resident pangolins have already established home ranges. Secondly, trafficked animals have often gone through a great deal of trauma and often use their remaining energy to appear strong and “escape”. Finally, we are still working out how to determine what type of resources and habitat the released individuals need to survive. Rarely does the wildlife crime suspect reveal where they first caught the pangolin, making it impossible to know which area or habitat it came from.

Preliminary research shows us that pangolins are highly territorial towards individuals of the same gender, similar to the social structure of leopards. The core area of one pangolin does not overlap with another of the same sex. While there is some overlap on the outer edges of their territories, it is likely that neighbours will use these areas at different times.

When two pangolins of the same sex encounter each other, they will fight to defend their territories. They use their sharp, strong claws to scratch, slice, and pull at one another. Common injuries are at the base of the scale where it splits from the skin due to pulling by the opponent. They also target the soft underside and genitals of their opponents. Fighting injuries are common, but resident pangolins are usually healthy enough to recover. Newly released pangolins that have only just recovered from being caught up in the illegal wildlife trade are at a major disadvantage to residents.

Resident pangolins are hard to detect and often we know nothing about pangolin populations at release sites. If a pangolin is released in the middle of a resident’s territory, it will likely be beaten up if it does not move out soon. One of the Pangolin Conservation and

Research Foundation (PCRF)’s projects is collecting sightings and signs of pangolins to find out more about resident populations at potential release sites in an effort to address this challenge.

How are pangolins monitored?

To find out how released pangolins are faring, the PCRF started a research project in collaboration with the Ministry of Environment, Forestry, and Tourism (MEFT). Released pangolins are tagged with GPS satellite transmitters and VHF radio transmitters to track their movements and behaviour soon after release. They are caught and weighed at regular intervals as a measure to establish how well they are doing – an individual that has settled in well and started foraging is expected to gain or maintain their weight.

The data on the movements of the animal, sent to us by the satellite transmitter, can be viewed on a laptop or cell phone. We can thus remotely view the pangolin’s movement patterns, indicating matters like dispersal (moving out of a territory), death, and poaching. The VHF transmitter allows us to physically locate the animal on the ground to check its weight, body condition, foraging habits, and burrows used. Foraging samples are collected to record dietary preferences in different habitats. Remotely-triggered camera traps are deployed at burrows to monitor the activity and presence of resident pangolins.

The results of this project will inform the development of release, softrelease, and post-release monitoring guidelines for the species. This is the first project in Namibia to collect detailed data on survival, which is connected to the research on the ecology and genetics of resident pangolins across Namibia. These research findings should improve our understanding of pangolins and increase the survival rate of those that are confiscated alive from the illegal trade.

How do we know if a pangolin is dispersing or settling down?

Once a pangolin is tagged and released, we monitor its movements to find out if it leaves the area where we released it (i.e. disperses) or if it settles down and starts to forage. Dispersal indicates that the release site was within another pangolin’s territory, or not suitable for the released animal for some other reason. Settling down and foraging shows that the area is an available territory and contains enough food and burrows.

Kelsey Prediger, PCRF

These wounds between the scales of a pangolin were caused during a territorial fight with another pangolin, which is one reason why released pangolins may not survive.

On a map generated by a tag, dispersal looks like constant moving with fairly long distances between GPS points which are set to hourly fixes, showing that the animal is doing little or no foraging along the way. If an animal finds what it considers to be a safe burrow, it shows centralised movement patterns – they go back to the burrow each morning and move around its vicinity at night. Foraging patterns look like zigzags across the map, and the individual covers much smaller distances over time than during dispersal.

These movements immediately after release can be the difference between life and death. Individuals that do not settle down will lose weight rapidly and be exposed to heat stress because they are not resting in a burrow during the heat of the day. Using this knowledge, we can re-capture these animals and put them through a soft-release or rehabilitation programme to improve their physical condition and gain strength before they go back into the wild.

What has happened to pangolins released in reserves and parks in Namibia?

The first monitored releases on a private nature reserve in 2018 and 2019 were unsuccessful. Three individuals left the reserve within seven days of release, and one died as a result of injuries from fighting with residents. The animals were released before we knew anything about resident pangolins in the area. Since then, we have discovered tightly packed pangolin home ranges across the reserve, leaving little room for new individuals.

Since 2021, five GPS-tagged pangolins have been released into National Parks (Khaudum, Etosha and Bwabwata) and six onto

private land. This work is made possible by the close collaboration between stakeholders in pangolin conservation which was sparked by the NPWG, with post-release monitoring conducted by the PCRF and MEFT.

Three of the five individuals were released in the same areas of Etosha National Park at different times. Their post-release movements show mixed results. The first one, released on 12 March, initially showed centralised movement and foraging patterns, and the first weight check revealed that this male had gained a healthy 1.5 kg. For unknown reasons, however, it dispersed soon after the weight check. The tag on this individual has stopped working, so we do not know if it has settled in a new area.

The second pangolin, a male that was released on 29 March, demonstrated dispersal movement patterns for the first two weeks before finally appearing to settle. During the dispersal, the transmitter often checked in all day and tag temperatures reached up to 40°C – indicating that the pangolin was not finding burrows for refuge, or they were very shallow, offering no relief from extreme temperatures. A weight check on 5 May showed he had lost 2 kg (over 20% of total weight) since the time of release, and he was found dead on 16 May. It is likely that the constant movement without sufficient refuge led to the severe weight loss and finally death.

The latest pangolin, released on 15 September, dispersed 5 km in one night but has since settled in an area and is demonstrating centralised foraging patterns. This individual will be monitored as long as the tag is active; new tags will be fitted to track its long-term survival.

Kelsey Prediger, PCRF

The sign of a truly successful release is reproduction. This camera trap photo shows a released female with her pup.

Centralised movement and foraging patterns shown by a released pangolin over a two-week period; it later dispersed.

Dispersal pattern of a released pangolin, which died at the end of this period.

Learning from past releases to improve pangolin survival

Post-release monitoring is just one aspect of pangolin conservation in Namibia. The work of the Blue Rhino Task Team, the Ministry of Environment, Forestry, and Tourism, and the Namibian Police is crucial to reduce pangolin poaching in the long term. Since releasing a confiscated pangolin is far from straightforward, the ultimate solution is to prevent poaching and keep pangolins in their home ranges. However, for as long as there are live trafficked pangolins, we will need to continuously improve their survival chances after rehabilitation and release.

Results from this project are reported back to the MEFT and the NPWG to inform conservation management planning. The NPWG has drafted the first Conservation Management Plan for pangolins in Namibia, which is slated for approval this year. Based on our findings, standard operating procedures for release, soft-release, and post-release monitoring will be developed to improve success rates of releasing confiscated pangolins.

Ideally, all live-confiscated individuals should be monitored until they have established a home range in their release site and remained there for more than six months. A higher bar for success, which would require even longer monitoring times, would be to show that the released individual has reproduced in its new home. To achieve this goal, more funding is needed to fit and replace tags during the monitoring period. This information would then be fed back into the guidelines for pangolin releases, ultimately improving the chances of survival for trafficked pangolins.

How can you help?

Consider donating to the NPWG emergency veterinary care fund or PCRF to support the care and release of these live-confiscated animals. Share what you have learned with others, as there are still many people who don’t know what a pangolin is! These relatively unknown animals provide valuable ecosystem services by consuming large numbers of ants and termites and they are an important part of Namibia’s natural heritage.

Acknowledgments

Kelsey Prediger is the Founder and Executive Director of the Pangolin Conservation & Research Foundation, the secretariat of the NPWG, and the co-chair for southern Africa of the IUCN SSC Pangolin Specialist Group. This research was conducted through multiple projects under her leadership with support from Novald Iyambo, Piet Beytell, Kenneth Uiseb, and Lovness Ndeiweda of MEFT, Dr. Morgan Hauptfleisch of the Namibia University of Science and Technology (NUST), Dr. John Irish of the National Museum, and Dr. Monique MacKenzie and Dr. Lindesay Scott-Hayward of the University of St. Andrews in Scotland. The Namibian Pangolin Working Group has also supported this project through their work on streamlining the process for live-confiscated pangolins. Rooikat Trust and the Namibian Chamber of Environment (NCE) have contributed to the veterinary care of animals. Generous financial and logistical support was received from NCE, Namibia2Go, B2Gold, Total, the Pangolin Consortium, the University of St. Andrews, NUST, MEFT, the Oak Foundation, Varta Batteries Namibia, Namib Tyre, Van Rensburg Holdings, Camp Hire Namibia, Otto Herrigel Environmental Trust and Bushwhackers.

Release sites and movement patterns of three pangolins in Etosha National Park. They are numbered in the order of their release.

TAKING AFRICAN WILDLIFE VETERINARY MEDICINE

TO NEW HEIGHTS

Text and Images by Giraffe Conservation Foundation

Have you ever darted a giraffe from a helicopter or moved a sable antelope? Have you fitted a satellite tracking device to an elephant or a gemsbok? And have you done all of this in a single day? Eight young African wildlife veterinarians who recently participated in a 10-day hands-on training course would answer with a resounding YES!

During a highly interactive time in the field at the Etosha Heights Private Reserve, these young veterinarians worked hand-in-hand with several highly experienced Namibian and international wildlife veterinarians. They gained valuable experience in wildlife capture, collaring, tagging, moving of animals and much more, while at the same time supporting the conservation management of one of Namibia’s largest private reserves.

As the wildlife conservation field evolves to cover multiple disciplines and a more holistic approach, the wildlife veterinarian has become a critical member of any team. This branch of veterinary medicine, however, is highly specialised and difficult to master, because of the diversity of species which a wildlife vet is likely to encounter – each with a unique anatomy and physiology. Darting, anaesthetising and treating a giraffe is a very different proposition to doing the same to an elephant or rhino or large carnivore, for example.

Compared with domestic animals, we have very little information on veterinary care and treatment for each of these species, making this branch of veterinary medicine particularly challenging. Even more concerning is the fact that most wildlife veterinarians enter the field with little knowledge in safe handling of dangerous drugs, darting and capture equipment, and appropriate protocols for handling wildlife, as these topics are not generally part of their university training.

Wildlife vets operating across the African continent are frequently required to work in remote and isolated settings, often with limited experience, practical skills, networks, or confidence to handle wildlife safely. Unfortunately, training opportunities in African wildlife restraint and immobilisation are limited and the cost is prohibitive to most. This places most African veterinarians at a distinct disadvantage, and often results in many African state wildlife departments and conservation organisations being forced to bring in external expertise – often from Southern Africa – rather than developing or enhancing their own local wildlife veterinary capacity. However, this is quite different in Namibia.

The University of Namibia (UNAM) School of Veterinary Medicine, established in 2015, is one of just a few veterinary schools in Africa that offer a solid introduction to wildlife medicine. Veterinarians who graduate from UNAM are equipped to enter the field with a practical working knowledge of the specialised drugs used in wildlife capture as well as species-specific protocols, use of specialised capture

equipment, and important legislative requirements for working with wildlife in Namibia. Furthermore, there is a broad and diverse network of highly experienced wildlife professionals (both veterinarians and conservationists) working in the country. As a result, Namibia is well placed to not only support local capacity building among Namibian wildlife vets and conservationists, but to also build the capacity of wildlife vets from other parts of Africa.

As the global leader in giraffe conservation, the Giraffe Conservation Foundation (GCF) currently implements and supports giraffe conservation initiatives in Namibia and 18 other African countries, often working closely with wildlife veterinarians. “Giraffe can be particularly difficult to immobilise due to their unique physiology,” says Dr Julian Fennessy, GCF’s Director of Conservation. “To ensure their safety, we often bring in vets from Namibia or South Africa if there is not sufficient experience in the country. The problem is not a lack of local vets, but often there is limited expertise in handling wildlife or simply a lack of confidence – confidence that can only be developed through practical experience. This is why we initiated discussions around a course for African wildlife vets here in Namibia.”

With this idea in mind, the GCF team approached potential partners in Namibia to develop the inaugural African Wildlife Veterinary Course. GCF, in collaboration with UNAM and the Namibia University of Science and Technology (NUST) – with the support of the African Wildlife Conservation Trust (AWCT), the Wildlife Conservation Alliance, and the Ministry of Environment, Forestry and Tourism (MEFT) – developed a dynamic, practical wildlife veterinary immobilisation course for young African vets. Over time, this course should create a network of capable African wildlife vets who can support multiple conservation projects and help each other through information exchange.

Tagging giraffe is a challenging operation. The immobilisation drugs have been reversed immediately and the giraffe is fully awake. The vets in charge collect samples, check on vitals and record all data before releasing the giraffe.

This waterbuck is blindfolded to reduce stress before it is moved to a different game camp within the Etosha Heights Private Reserve.

The training kicked off with a three-day intensive lecture series in Windhoek and was open to all Namibian vets for their continuing professional development. Specialist lectures ranged from general physiology and pharmacology to species-specific protocols and human safety considerations to wildlife medicine legislation. Experienced wildlife vets facilitated discussions by sharing different experiences from Namibia and other African countries, particularly related to varied drug and equipment availability, the ethics of wildlife tagging, policies and legislation, conservation science and management, and importantly, partnership development. Participants were brought upto-date with the latest developments and ideas in wildlife veterinary medicine and had the opportunity to reconnect with many familiar faces as well as establish new professional connections.

“Wildlife in Africa can ultimately only be conserved by African people – they simply need the relevant skills and opportunities to do this effectively,” says Dr Sara Ferguson, GCF’s Conservation Health Coordinator and lead veterinarian during the course. “Upskilling young Africans is an important step towards this goal and it is particularly important for wildlife veterinarians, who play a critical role in conservation,” she adds.

Following the lecture series, eight aspiring wildlife vets from the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), Mozambique, Namibia, Tanzania and Uganda, four members of the MEFT game capture team, four wildlife ecologists and seven highly experienced wildlife vets travelled to Etosha Heights Private Reserve adjacent to Etosha National Park for the 10-day practical section of the course. Most newly-graduated veterinarians are uncomfortable taking responsibility for procedures they have not performed yet, so this practical exercise on a variety of common African species allowed them to learn by doing. Participation of international vets was made possible through the Namibia

After a successful immobilisation and tagging, the young vets look on as the oryx finds her feet and runs off.

Dr Hagnesio Chiponde from the Mozambique Wildlife Alliance demonstrates how he stabilises his hands when filling a dart with drugs, while Drs Joshua Lubega (GCF, Uganda), Israel Amuthitu (UNAM, Namibia) and Dominique Tshimbalanga Mukadi (African Parks, DRC) look on.

The team tags an oryx and at the same time collects samples, measurements and checks on the animal’s vitals.

“The old adage ‘I hear and I forget. I see and I remember. I do and I understand’ is particularly relevant in the wildlife veterinary arena, for it is only through the actual acts of planning and executing the immobilisation of a wild animal that the veterinarian fully hones his or her skills in the face of challenging situations.” says Dr Mark Jago, Senior Lecturer at UNAM’s School of Veterinary Medicine. “It was a privilege to be part of something where young vets from around the African continent demonstrate knowledge, passion and skill in abundance, and there are few things as rewarding as being part of an opportunity for passionate professionals to take their skill set to the next level.”

During the hands-on training each of the aspiring African vets took the lead during the immobilisation of at least one animal

under the guidance of one of the expert vet mentors. Prior to each immobilisation, drug protocols and appropriate darting equipment were discussed, and each operation (on the ground or helicopterbased) was carefully planned and executed. Open debriefing discussions after each immobilisation offered ample opportunity for a peer-to-peer skills exchange, analysis of what worked well and what did not, including the effects of different drug regimens used for comparison.

During these discussions the participants often became the teachers based on their own experiences, thus creating a conducive and productive training environment. Each of the African wildlife vets brought a host of real-life experiences from their respective workplace and country to the discussions. This cohort of trainees now has an important network of peers for future information exchange, and an impressive resource of knowledge to tap into when back home.

Veterinary Council granting temporary registration for the duration of the field course.

DR TSHIMBALANGA’S STORY

Dr Dominique Tshimbalanga, a DRC vet, shared his story: “I always wanted to get involved in wildlife veterinary medicine, but in the DRC this was difficult. When I managed to secure a position with the African Parks Network (APN) in Garamba National Park, I was very excited. However, while I was based in a core wildlife area, I was in charge of the canine unit. I looked after the anti-poaching dogs that were used in the park. For any wildlife work, APN brought in vets from South Africa and Europe and I was mostly not even allowed to shadow them. This was becoming increasingly frustrating and I was almost ready to give up on my dream. But then things changed and I was invited by GCF to participate in this amazing course in Namibia. I learnt so much and now have a network of peers to discuss any questions I may have – and I do have many now that I have been promoted to Resident Veterinarian in Garamba National Park. This promotion was a direct result of gaining new skills and hands-on experience during this course. GCF has given me the key – now it is up to me to use it!”

Dr Tshimbalanga’s story is more than enough reason for us to hold more courses of this kind in future. Ultimately, we aim to empower young African wildlife vets to become the next leaders in conservation and secure a bright future for wildlife conservation efforts in Namibia and throughout Africa.

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

Participation of the eight African vets was fully funded through the Giraffe Conservation Foundation. The field course was generously supported by the African Wildlife Conservation Trust (AWCT), which kindly made its helicopter available for the training. AWCT, African Wildlife Services, MEFT, UNAM’s School of Veterinary Medicine and Wildscapes Veterinary provided valuable veterinary technical skills and mentorship. Financial support was received from GCF and their donors, including the Ivan Carter Wildlife Conservation Alliance and Oklahoma City Zoo. A special thanks goes to Etosha Heights Private Reserve, Natural Selection, the Namibia University of Science and Technology (NUST) and UNAM’s School of Veterinary Medicine for supporting this field course.

Two of the participants, Drs Hugo Paixao Perira and Hagnesio Chiponde from the Mozambique Wildlife Alliance, said about their impressions: “It is incredible how much you can learn in one week. We have worked with wildlife before, but this was an amazing opportunity to gain experience with animals we have not yet encountered in our professional practice. Working together with so many experts in their fields has been invaluable. Every participant and mentor brought something different to the course and having these open discussions has simply been fantastic.”

Capturing and moving sable antelope and waterbuck between camps on Etosha Heights Private Reserve, and fitting eland, African savannah elephant, gemsbok, Angolan giraffe, and Hartmann’s mountain zebra with tracking devices for remote monitoring were among the field course activities. Solar-powered Ceres Trace and Ceres Wild GPS satellite ear tags were fitted during this course – in most cases for the very first time on species in the wild. Weapon

handling and target practice with different dart projector models – both from the ground, from a vehicle, and from a helicopter –were another valuable aspect of the course.

It must be pointed out that all immobilisations in the field were undertaken as part of planned reserve management activities and landscape-level long-term conservation research programmes. The tracking devices that were fitted are part of a research project which explores the effect of different wildlife land use types – national park, private reserve, commercial game farms and communal conservancies – on biodiversity and ecological productivity in the Greater Etosha South-West Landscape (an area of almost two million hectares). Spearheaded by the NUST Biodiversity Research Centre and GCF, this study is a collaboration with many local and international partners and stakeholders.

Group photo with all young African vets, their mentors and the MEFT game capture team.

When two carnivores meet it is often an aggressive encounter. Honey badgers are well known for ‘punching’ above their weight.

R. van Wyk

THE NEXT STEPS FOR CARNIVORE CONSERVATION IN NAMIBIA

By NCE, LCMAN and MEFT

Namibia is home to 34 terrestrial carnivore species – from Aardwolf to Zorilla (striped polecat), from the diminutive dwarf mongoose to the heavyweight lion, not to forget the world’s fastest land mammal (cheetah) and the renowned ‘tough guy’ of the African savannah (honey badger). Each species is unique and fascinating in its own right; all of them are worth conserving as part of Namibia’s natural heritage.

Producing the Carnivore Red Data Book

Conserving any species requires a detailed understanding of its current distribution and population trends, ecology and behaviour, alongside the known threats it faces. Drawing together all of this information in the Conservation Status and Red List of the Terrestrial Carnivores of Namibia (Carnivore Red Data Book for short) was no mean feat. From the initial idea during a workshop in 2017 until the final editorial touches and publishing earlier this year, the Carnivore Red Data Book involved 25 species assessors, 30 contributors and 31 reviewers.

As a joint publication between the Ministry of Environment, Forestry and Tourism (MEFT), the Large Carnivore Management Association of

Namibia (LCMAN) and the Namibian Chamber of Environment (NCE), this book is a testament to a successful collaborative process. Yet this is just the starting point for building a cohesive, joint action plan for carnivore conservation in Namibia. Having identified the threats and actions for each carnivore species, these and other stakeholders must work together as part of the newly established Carnivore Working Group to put these ideas into practise.

National Red Data Books follow a system created by the International Union of Conservation of Nature (IUCN) to determine the conservation status of each species. While the process is similar nationally and internationally, the global status of a species may be different to the national status, as it may be more or less threatened in one country than it is in the rest of the world.

The IUCN conservation status categories for all plant and animal species. Namibia’s carnivores fall between Least Concern and Critically Endangered.

Namibian environmental conditions result in species that thrive in wetter environments (e.g. otters, serval) being naturally rare, while species that prefer drier environments (e.g. brown hyaena, black-footed cat) are favoured. For example, the black mongoose clearly favours the dry, rocky habitats in north-western Namibia and south-western Angola, as it occurs nowhere else on earth.

Species

Global Status Namibia Status Namibian range (km2)

% Global range

Population estimate Trend in Namibia

African wild dog EN CR 131,700 10.1 137-359 Stable Cheetah VU EN 439,400 14.1 1,500 Decreasing Black-footed cat VU VU 538,000 24.3 2,600 Decreasing

Leopard VU VU 776,800 9.1 <12,000 Variable Lion VU VU 94,300 5.7 800 Stable

Spotted hyaena LC VU 399,800 2.7 615-715 Stable Brown hyaena NT NT 685,600 28.0 <3,000 Stable Serval LC NT 291,000 2.3 1,500-4,000 Stable

African clawless otter NT NT ±34,000 <1 Unknown Decreasing Spotted-necked otter NT NT ±23,000 <1 Unknown Decreasing African striped weasel LC NT ±46,000 <1 Unknown Unknown

Eleven carnivore species in Namibia are considered Near Threatened or worse. Some species have naturally small ranges in the country due to environmental conditions (otters and weasels), while others are dependent on Namibia for large portions of their global range (brown hyaena, black-footed cat and cheetah). The population estimates and trends are based on the latest available data and expert assessments in the Carnivore Red Data Book.

Key threats to Namibian carnivores

In the Namibian assessment, all 34 species fell within the categories from Least Concern to Critically Endangered. Eleven species were classified as Near Threatened or worse, including five cat species, two hyaena species, the African wild dog, two otter species and the African striped weasel. All of these except the weasel face known threats to their survival. Reducing or eliminating these threats are the main focus of carnivore conservationists across Namibia.

Threats that affect more than one of the eleven carnivore species assessed as Near Threatened or worse in the Carnivore Red Data Book. Not all of these threats are equally severe for all species that are affected by them. Habitat loss in the graph includes habitat degradation and fragmentation, which are similar threats.

Whereas some individual species will require action plans tailored to the particular threats they face, multiple species would benefit from action plans that tackle the most common threats. Based on the Carnivore Red Data Book assessments, three threats affect eight species each: human-wildlife conflict, bycatch, and habitat loss, degradation or fragmentation.

While many carnivores are deliberately killed due to human-wildlife conflict (either in response to livestock losses or as a preventative measure), others are killed accidentally when other animals are being targeted – an issue known as bycatch. Carnivores that do not cause livestock losses at all can thus be killed as bycatch when snares, gin traps or poison are used to remove livestock-killing species. Poison is the worst of these methods, as it threatens vultures and birds of prey that are also threatened with extinction. Snares and gin traps are a close second, affecting many non-target animals. Reducing indiscriminate killing methods therefore requires special attention as part of broader plans to address humancarnivore conflict. This includes encouraging farmers to protect their livestock within healthy functioning ecosystems rather than fighting predators and in the process causing significant damage to their environment.

In the wetter areas of Namibia, habitat loss is caused mainly by land transformation to crop fields and through deforestation.

In drier areas, habitat is more likely to be degraded due to poor rangeland management (e.g. resulting in bush encroachment or other ecological changes) or fragmented by game-proof fencing that prevents some species from accessing the available habitat. When combined, these three habitat-related threats affect eight carnivore species.

Poaching or live capture for the illegal wildlife trade were described as threats to seven species, largely based on increased poaching in other countries that could become a problem in Namibia if left unheeded. The demand for lion bones and claws, leopard skins, and hyaena (both species) body parts in the Far East and within Africa (for status or traditional medicine purposes) drive poaching of these species. Capturing live cheetahs to be kept as pets within Namibia is problematic, although this is on a much smaller scale than the demand for pet cheetahs in the Middle East.

Seven carnivore species are reportedly killed in road accidents frequently enough for this to be considered a threat to their populations in some places. Since most carnivores are active during the night and at dawn or dusk, most of these accidents occur at these times. Tar roads that bisect national parks (e.g. Bwabwata) are a major source of road fatalities. Limiting the speed and restricting travel times to daylight hours would prevent many accidents and reduce the number of carnivores killed on the roads.

The smallest cat species in Namibia, the black-footed cat, is a desert specialist and occurs in the southern parts of the country.

Brown hyaenas are mostly scavengers, while cheetahs rarely scavenge. This hyaena is helping itself to part of the cheetahs’ latest kill.

The African wild dog is Critically Endangered in Namibia and our most threatened carnivore species.

The honey badger is considered Least Concern in Namibia and globally.

A Sliwa

Derek Keats

Derek Keats

Gail Thomson

Trophy hunting was flagged as a threat to all three big cat species and the two hyaena species. The social structures and behavioural ecology of these species make their populations especially vulnerable to over-harvesting. Lions and leopards are infanticidal – i.e. when new males take over a territory they will kill any young cubs that are present at the time – which means that the removal of a dominant breeding male by any means could result in losing the cubs he sired. Both hyaena species have complex social structures that are disrupted by the removal of high-ranking females; females are easily mistaken for males during a hunt because they are slightly larger and their sex is difficult to determine (especially for spotted hyaena females, which have a pseudo-penis and pseudo-testes).

This threat is more complex than others, however, since the substantial money generated from trophy-hunting the big cats can offset livestock or game losses they cause, thus improving farmer tolerance and reducing human-carnivore conflict. Tolerance for leopards on freehold farms, where they occur widely, is linked to their value for trophy hunting. For all three big cat species, hunting quotas must be balanced to reduce negative impacts on cat populations and increase the benefits flowing to the most affected farmers.

The argument for hunting hyaenas is much weaker, as the trophy prices for both species are low. Brown hyaenas are primarily scavengers and rarely cause livestock losses, thus hunting them is unlikely to reduce human-carnivore conflict. Spotted hyaenas do cause livestock losses, but the low trophy fee is unlikely to increase farmer tolerance. Consequently, little is gained from hyaena trophy hunting in terms of increased tolerance, while the negative impacts of mistakenly hunting female hyaenas can be severe.

Negative perceptions of carnivores are an overarching threat that exacerbates other issues, especially human-carnivore conflict. Spotted hyaenas and African wild dogs are particularly disliked by farmers, while fishermen perceive the two otter species to be a threat to fish populations. A different kind of perception affects the black-footed cat, which although assessed as Vulnerable both nationally and internationally, receives no formal protection in Namibia because it is perceived to be secure. How we perceive carnivores thus affects the degree to which they are persecuted and our willingness to conserve them.

Climate change affected four species, especially the otter species and serval that rely on wetter habitats which are predicted to become drier over time. Disease was a particular concern for African wild dogs. They are highly susceptible to diseases borne by domestic dogs – e.g. rabies, canine distemper and parvovirus. Studies of black-footed cats show high mortality rates due to a combination of disease and predation by larger carnivores (e.g. black-backed jackal). The final risk that affected more than one species was prey decline, which is a problem in some areas. Lack of natural prey exacerbates human-carnivore conflict, as livestock are more frequently killed when prey populations are low.

Elzanne McCulloch

The lion is Africa’s largest carnivore and is listed as Vulnerable both globally and in Namibia.

Addressing the threats by taking action

In a similar way to the threats, some actions can benefit several species at once, provided they are centrally coordinated. To achieve this, one of the recommendations of the Carnivore Red Data Book is to establish a Carnivore Working Group chaired by MEFT that includes LCMAN members, farmers unions, conservancies, hunters’ associations and universities. Since many of the actions required – e.g. mitigating human-wildlife conflict, reducing bycatch and improving habitats – need to be implemented by multiple stakeholders, this working group can chart a collective way forward that takes different perspectives and interests into account. While the Carnivore Red Data Book provides a scientific perspective on each species, successful conservation requires scientific findings to be merged with socio-economic realities, which are best understood by non-academic stakeholder groups.

Within the working group, specialist task forces could be set up to focus on highly threatened species that face unique challenges (e.g. African wild dog), or multiple similar species (e.g. brown and spotted hyaenas), or to address some overarching common threats (e.g. negative perceptions). Besides the threatened species, many

Although it is common throughout Africa, the spotted hyaena is considered Vulnerable in Namibia, where the arid climate is better suited to brown hyaenas.

of the smaller carnivores are understudied in Namibia according to the Carnivore Red Book assessments – another task force could be dedicated to filling these research gaps.

As a group chaired by MEFT, the recommendations and ideas relating to policy changes are more likely to be taken up than if special interest groups approach MEFT individually. The presence of farmers, hunters and conservancies in the group is crucial to ensuring that these ideas are practical in the real world. Conservation organisations, universities and MEFT officials can draw on their experience and research as a basis for joint research or conservation initiatives.

From a human point of view, carnivores are among the most revered and valued species in the world, yet they are also some of the most difficult to conserve. Producing the Carnivore Red Data Book is an important first step that presents our current knowledge of these species and the threats they face along with the actions required to address them. The next step is to establish the Carnivore Working Group to recommend policies, develop research agendas and action plans, and take practical steps towards improving the conservation status of carnivores in Namibia.

Trevor Mcintyre

Emsie

Verwey

The African clawless otter is one of two species occurring in Namibia. Due to Namibia’s arid climate, otters only occur in the perennial rivers on the borders of the country.

Along Namibia’s desert coastline, the brown hyaena is the top terrestrial predator, mainly hunting seal pups. Black-backed jackals are hoping to have a share of this kill.

Ruben Portas

ABOUT FAIRIES OF ALL SIZES

Ongava Research Centre

By John Mendelsohn, Elizabeth Shangano and Fillemon Shatipamba

Science and art are two sides of the same creative coin. Both employ curiosity, are inspired by the enigmatic, intrigued by the unknown, and often in awe of the beautiful. The most extreme enigmas are surely the work of fairies, or so we imagine. Why fairies? Because none of us have seen them, and so we can only be fascinated by the sorts of things that fairies might make, or what they can do.

The two circles at the top of the image are each about 700 metres in diameter. The bare, whitish rings around the fairy forests and larger rounded blocks of forest are clear. The dark area across much of the lower part of the image was recently burnt. The centre of the image is at 15.587 South and 19.442 East, some 60 km SSE of Cuito Cuanavale.

Microsoft’s Bing aerial imagery

Neat circles in vegetation are particularly bizarre and attractive, so much so that the hundreds of thousands of bare round shapes in the Namib Desert are said to be fairy circles. They are also the battleground of scientists who argue over explanations for their structure and origins: are they formed by foraging termites, poisons left by euphorbias, or strange ways in which plants are spaced because of competition for water and nutrients, for example?1

We have found two other communities of fairies. They are the subject of this article, and they, too, are round. We use the more awkward term fairy spheres for one form to avoid being embroiled in the contests that surround the Namib’s fairy circles, and the circular limits imposed on the term.2 Our fairy spheres are also bare areas, many of which are almost perfect circles. But they are in bushy areas in central northern Namibia, which are quite different from the Namib desert’s sparse grass cover.

The others are fairy forests in miombo woodlands growing in sandy soils in Angola and probably elsewhere. What follows comes from our pleasure in trying to find the fairies responsible for their spheres and forests. It is our hope that more creative minds build on these observations to convert these mysteries into better understood marvels of the natural world.

Fairy spheres – of termites and grasses

Active termite mounds provide ideal growing conditions for many plants, likely a consequence of termites bringing moist and fertile soil to the surface as part of their mound-building activities.3 But as the mounds age, broaden and decline in height, fringes of bare soil develop and seem to steadily spread outwards around the mounds in many areas.

John Mendelsohn

John Mendelsohn

Stefan Redecker

The work of two kinds of fairies: Namibian spheres (top) and Angolan forests (below)

At about 35 metres in diameter this is the biggest fairy sphere we have found (look in Google Earth at 19.4169 South, 15.9169 East), just south-west of Etosha Safari Camp.

Once dead, the mounds slump and many are further flattened by large herbivores (e.g. gemsbok and zebra) trampling the surrounds and rubbing themselves on the mounds.

Consequently, areas of bare soil increase over time around dead termite mounds. Bear in mind that the soil spread out around and from the mounds originally came from some depth below the surface. The largest fairy sphere we have found is about 35 metres in diameter, but most are between 15 and 25 metres in diameter.

A distinctive feature of the spheres in certain areas are the sharp margins between the bare areas and surrounding vegetation. Within less than 50 centimetres of the margins, the grass cover and species composition changes abruptly. The spheres with sharp margins seem to be limited to clayey soils on relatively flat ground.

In the Ongava Game Reserve, short, probably nutritious grass species predominate inside the circles after good rains have fallen, while the grasses outside form a denser, taller cover of vegetation that is largely avoided by grazers. Given the many game paths connecting these spheres, it seems clear that these short grasses attract zebra, springbok, white rhino and impala. Once grazed, the circles remain bare until good rains fall again in the next year or following years. In these respects, our fairy spheres function like so-called grazing lawns that are more extensive in wetter parts of Africa.4

However, something else is most peculiar. Broad-leafed and woody plants are absent from the bare spheres, despite the surrounding area often being densely vegetated with these plants, and despite their likely previous vigorous growth immediately around tall, younger, occupied mounds. Many of the trees and shrubs growing in areas near

the spheres are obviously old and mature, having grown there for many decades.

A good number of spheres at Ongava have become permanently vegetated again with tall grasses, mostly by species that are not particularly favoured by herbivores. The change from bare areas to grassy spheres probably happens over quite a few years. And we imagine that woody plants will then return even later, perhaps after many more decades.

Our observations have sparked many simple questions that invite further investigation, such as: What removes the vegetation from the bare areas in the first place? Why do many of the spheres have such sharp edges? Why do they occur in certain areas and not others? How old are the spheres? What causes their initial revegetation by grasses but not by woody plants? How long does revegetation take?

We think that some of the possible answers to these questions are also simple. For instance, the properties of soils brought up by termites from underground may inhibit the growth of certain plants; the termites eat away the roots of plants growing in the spheres; or the termites change the chemistry or structure of the soil in ways that retard plant growth. Perhaps the soils create nutrient hotspots offering high quality forage that herbivores remove and trample, leaving the spheres bare; or certain grasses grow so rapidly in these richer soils that they exhaust supplies of nutrients for slower growing perennial plants.

Each answer seemingly has merit, but fails at some stage to hold water, or at least enough water. Perhaps two or more processes are at work, some possibly important during the early stages of termite mound development, others perhaps operating later as the mounds

die off.

Investigating fairy spheres may seem to be esoteric or unimportant. Not so. These spheres are numerous, and in certain areas they may make grazing temporarily available to lots of animals. We estimate that 20% of the vegetated area of Etosha National Park has these spheres. Taking an average radius of 7.5 metres per sphere and a conservative density of 100 spheres per square kilometre suggests that at times there could be over 6,000 hectares of nutritious grazing in over 330,000 spheres in Etosha.

These are estimates, but surely tantalising enough to seek answers on the origins, functioning and effects of these spheres. Perhaps the processes at work will provide clues about measures to limit bush growth and control its encroachment in Namibia? And, who knows, studies of these spheres may even shed light on the enigmatic activities of fairies in the Namib? Indeed, we surmise that those fairy circles could also be bare areas that persist after termite colonies have died, as Ken Tinley suggested in 1971.6

John Mendelsohn

A typical circle in the Ongava area after good rain in March 2021 and showing the sharp edge between grass grazed within the sphere and the surrounding, probably less palatable grass. The same circle is visible in Google Earth at 19.3693 South 15.8665 East.

A termite mound surrounded by a bare area, but without a sharp edge to the surrounding matrix of grass. Such spheres occur commonly in the dolomite hills at Ongava, and are abundant in parts of Etosha, elsewhere in northern central Namibia and the Kruger National Park.5

John Mendelsohn

At Ongava, the spheres are often arranged alongside the bases of dolomite ridges about 80 to 100 metres apart which is the kind of spacing recorded elsewhere.7 These three spheres are visible in Google Earth at 19.3605 South 15.8677 East. Note the relatively small bare area surrounding the centre of each sphere, then the broader surrounding area devoid of woody growth, and then dense mopane vegetation around the spheres. The dark spots are the original termite mounds which are yet to die off completely or be obliterated by erosion.

Stefan Redecker

Typical concentrations of plant growth on and around young and active termite mounds in northern central Namibia. All these mounds and those surrounded by bare spheres were probably built by the termite species Macrotermes michaelseni

Fairy forests – an Angolan enigma

We first came across these remarkable features in Google Earth, a free service of high-resolution satellite images that has led to many discoveries all over the world. Two things stood out in the images of south-eastern Angola: many patches of forest were circular in form, and they and other areas of forest with smoothly rounded edges had distinctive white margins. The smaller the forest patches, the more circular they were. More fairies at work?

Fieldwork in south-eastern Angola led to several observations and tentative theories. Both the rounded forests and the white margins are associated with miombo forests on sandy soils in Angola (the dominant trees in these forests are Julbenardia paniculata, Brachystegia spiciformis and Brachystegia longifolia and Cryptosepalum exfoliatum).8 The white areas are sparsely vegetated with little grass, and they are white because so much of the pale underlying soil is visible from above.

Two big questions: why do the patches of forest have rounded edges, and what could form their bare margins? We believe that the answers lie in the hot fires that burn here so often, indeed almost every year.9 The fires are largely concentrated in two habitats: grasslands on wet soils in floodplains and drainage lines, and in open woodlands that are scattered in and around the miombo forests. The open woodlands are savannah-like, their relatively abundant grass cover providing fuel for fires. By contrast, the dense miombo forests seldom burn because there is little fuel to burn on the forest floors.

John Mendelsohn

Steve Spence

Open savannah-like woodland on the right that burns regularly, the bare margin in the centre, and dense miombo woodland or forest on the left. Look at this area in Google Earth at 13.093 South, 18.841 East.

We suggest that the rounded edges and circular forests are due to fires killing trees and bushes growing on the margins of the dense woodland, rather like ocean waves smoothing the shores of sandy coastlines. With repeated fires, any outlying trees susceptible to burning are shaved away, leaving the forests with well-defined, rounded edges.

But there may be a second reason why the miombo forests don’t burn: the bare, white margins act as firebreaks. Most are 20 to 40 metres wide, and with little grass or other fuel they are good at keeping away scorching flames from the forest edges. Fires can do great damage if they get into these forests, which does happen occasionally when flames are so fanned by strong winds that they roar through the forest canopy, killing most trees in their paths.

This leads us to the intriguing possibility that miombo trees protect themselves by forming firebreaks. What, however,

could suppress the growth of grass around the forests? One plausible hypothesis is that forest trees produce chemicals that are specifically poisonous to grasses and other plants that burn easily. These are known as allelopathic chemicals, which certain plants produce to protect themselves against other plants. 10 Thus, allelopathic chemicals produced by miombo trees might diffuse out of the forests to poison the surrounding margins, and their diffusion may be aided by the sandy soils in these areas of southeastern Angola.

Which of the miombo trees might produce these allelopathic effects? A good candidate is Brachystegia bakeriana , which was found to be the dominant miombo tree on the margins of the forests. However, other miombo species may also inhibit plant growth as suggested by the presence of small bare patches within forests, and the sparse growth of plants often found in the margins of fields cleared inside forests.

A truncated fairy forest and its white periphery adjoining a drainage line which is flanked with its own white margins that may be concentrations of kaolin (a fine white clay) leached from the surrounding woodlands, a suggestion made by Ken Tinley, one of Africa’s greatest ecologists.

John Mendelsohn

Interestingly, these rounded forests and white margins are not seen further south in the so-called Baikiaea-Burkea woodlands that are also burnt very often and that also grow on deep Kalahari sand. Brachystegia trees do not grow in these woodlands in southern Angola and northern Namibia.

One last observation comes from Howard Hunter who found miombo woodlands with rounded edges and bare margins in Niassa province in northern Mozambique. Have a look at this area in Google Earth (11.8414 South 35.6975 East). And the soils there? Sandy!

Here ends this collection of curiosity, observations, and speculations. We hope our ideas are reasonably informed, but now they need to be tested, refined, or replaced with better explanations and hypotheses. We also hope that energetic young scientists are challenged by these ideas. From their investigations much that is good will be found in Africa’s bushlands and forests.

References

1 Meyer, J.M. et al. 2021. The fairy circles (circular barren patches) of the Namib Desert-What do we know about their cause 50 years after their first description? South African Journal of Botany, 140, 226-239.

2 Getzin S, et al. 2021. Definition of “fairy circles” and how they differ from other common vegetation gaps and plant rings. Journal of Vegetation Science; 2:e13092.

3 Jouquet, P. et al. 2016. Termites: the neglected soil engineers of tropical soils. Soil Science, 181(3/4), 157-165.

4 Hempson, G.P. et al. 2015. Ecology of grazing lawns in Africa. Biological Reviews, 90(3), pp.979-994.

5 Davies, A.B. et al. 2016. Termite mounds differ in their importance for herbivores across savanna types, seasons and spatial scales. Oikos, 125(5), 726-734.

6 Tinley, K.L., 1971. Etosha and the Kaokoveld. African Wild Life (Supplement) 25, 1–16.

7 Turner J.S. 2000. Architecture and morphogenesis in the mound of Macrotermes michaelseni (Sjötedt) (Isoptera: Termitidae, Macrotermitinae) in northern Namibia. Cimbebasia 16: 143–175.

8 Goyder D.J. et al. 2018. The Cuito catchment of the Okavango system: a vascular plant checklist for the Angolan headwaters. PhytoKeys 113: 1-31.

9 Mendelsohn JM & Martins A. 2018. River catchments and development prospects in south-eastern Angola. Report for World Wildlife Fund (WWF), The Nature Conservancy (TNC) and National Geographic Okavango Wilderness Project (NGOWP).

10 Reigosa, M. J. et al. (Eds.). 2006. Allelopathy: a physiological process with ecological implications. Springer Science & Business Media.

Acknowledgments

We pestered many experts on enigmas and fairies, among them Mike Bingham, William Bond, Tony Cunningham, Helge Denker, Frank Eckhardt, Rina Grant, Wayne Hansen, Chris Hines, Howard Hunter, Brian Huntley, Eugene Moll, Andy Moore, Ken Tinley, Cornelis van der Waal, and the late Marty McFarlane and Bob Scholes. For logistical support we thank Ongava Research Centre and the National Geographic Okavango Wilderness Project. Stefan Redecker and Steve Spence captured wonderful images with their drones. We are grateful to everyone for their enthusiasm and patience.

NAMIBIA IS TAKING THE FIGHT TO POACHERS AND TRAFFICKERS

By WWF-Namibia Wildlife and Landscapes team

On 14 June 2022, the Ministry of Environment Forestry and Tourism (MEFT) issued a short, devastating media release to inform the public that 11 black rhino carcasses had been discovered in Etosha National Park. The most recent was the carcass of a just three-week-old calf. The statement included a foreboding line: “This is regrettable and a strong indication that the fight against poaching is not over.”

It felt like a punch in the gut – to the nation, to people around the world who care about conservation, and particularly to the dedicated men and women who work tirelessly to combat wildlife crime on many fronts.

The good news – and it is very good news in the fight to protect global biodiversity – is that Namibia remains home to significant populations of cheetah, lion, elephant, and many more critical species, among them the world’s largest population of black rhino. With local and global technical and financial support, including support from the WWF network, Namibia’s efforts to protect wildlife led by the MEFT are largely working, but the fight continues.

André Baumgarten

Protecting Namibia’s conservation gains against new threats

For the past three decades Namibia has adopted conservation approaches that have expanded the range and increased the population sizes of many wildlife species, including black rhinoceros, elephants, and large carnivores. Wildlife recoveries have been particularly noteworthy within the communal areas of Namibia, attributed to the emergence of communal conservancies since 1996. Namibia’s progressive legislation has allowed people living with wildlife to benefit from these natural resources, resulting in community stewardship, goodwill, and support for nature conservation. Over this period, poaching activities remained at all-time lows.

However, as ivory and rhino horn prices escalated, elephant and rhino poaching became highly criminalised and organised. It became evident that community goodwill and support was no longer enough on its own to combat poaching. This is especially true for the national parks and freehold land outside communal conservancies, where poaching has become increasingly problematic. Targeted interventions through law enforcement, investigations, and prosecutions were needed to counteract organised poaching syndicates operating across Namibia and beyond our borders.

The increase in poaching coincided with below average rainfall, slow economic growth and reduced government budgets for conservation. WWF Namibia recognised that a more focused anti-poaching and law enforcement support effort was required alongside strengthened community stewardship. Together with the MEFT, Save the Rhino Trust, conservancies that employ Rhino Rangers, the Namibia Nature Foundation, Rooikat Trust, the Blue Rhino Task Team, and many other organisations, WWF Namibia is engaged in targeted projects that work with local communities, national parks staff and law enforcement officers to address the multi-faceted challenge of wildlife crime from many angles simultaneously.

Grassroots and across borders

For the past five years the Combating Wildlife Crime Project (CWCP) has sought to counter growing threats from transnational wildlife crime against globally significant rhino populations in Namibia’s northwest and the continent’s largest elephant population in the Kavango-Zambezi Transfrontier Conservation Area (KAZA).

CWCP, funded by USAID and managed by WWF, has two distinct goals: To increase the black rhino population in Namibia, and to stabilise and contribute to the range expansion of KAZA elephants over the next five years.

Providing support to the Rhino Pride campaign in the northwest, helping community conservation programmes take root in Angola and working with TRAFFIC to gain insight into wildlife trafficking trends are a few of the projects that the CWCP and its partners have implemented. These projects have helped to build and expand a regional network of civil society organisations working on wildlife crime-related matters.

Given the project’s clear-cut and broad goals, it is critical to mark milestones. Mike Strang, Chief of Party for CWCP says, “In the

northwest, rhino poaching was reduced by 78% during the project timeline, with more than two years of zero poaching recorded for 2018-2020 and between August 2020 and April 2022, plus a good record of births for the black rhino population during that time.”

In the national parks

The Integrated Wildlife Protection Project (IWPP) supports the MEFT Wildlife Protection Service (WPS), which was created in 2015 to counter the increasing pressure exerted on wildlife, especially rhinos and elephants, by organised crime syndicates. The Federal Republic of Germany supports and finances the project through the German Development Bank (KfW) and invests in infrastructure development, equipment, and training of WPS staff.

New infrastructure is planned for Otjovasandu in western Etosha National Park, Bwabwata National Park and Sesfontein in the northwest. The rangers are trained to use the Spatial Monitoring and Reporting Tool (SMART) system, which allows them to collect georeferenced information and photographs while on patrol or when responding to poaching incidents. The information is recorded on a smartphone and uploaded to a central database. The automated

reports and analyses produced by the SMART system can help improve patrol effectiveness and provide additional information for investigating and prosecuting wildlife crime.

As Bennett Kahuure, Director of Parks and Wildlife at MEFT, explained, “The IWPP contributes significantly towards the reduction in illegal killing of wildlife including the illegal harvesting of other natural resources in Namibia which has negative economic impacts on the tourism sector in Namibia.”

The IWPP also supports research, wildlife monitoring and the development of strategic and technological advances to curb the illegal wildlife trade. WWF is a technical advisor to the project and supports the MEFT in the financial and administrative management of the project through a unit of five full-time WWF staff based at MEFT.

In the courts

In 2016, WWF received funding from the U.S. Department of State – International Narcotic and Law Enforcement Affairs (INL) – for two projects: Combating wildlife trafficking in Namibia, and countering wildlife trafficking in Namibia and KAZA.

The overall goal of the INL projects is to reduce poaching and trafficking of protected animals and their body parts originating from Namibia and to reduce the ability of criminal groups to carry out and profit from poaching and trafficking protected animals and plants, originating from or transiting through Africa.

To achieve this, Namibia’s criminal justice institutions must be strengthened for successful law enforcement, investigation, and prosecution of wildlife crimes. The projects aim to support wildlife crime response strategies developed by the government of Namibia over the past few years, which resulted in the National Strategy on Wildlife Protection and Law Enforcement and Namibia’s Parks and Wildlife Bill. Furthermore, the projects aim to reduce wildlife crime by improving the capacity of the forensics and criminal justice system in Namibia to increase successful prosecution rates of wildlife criminals and trafficking syndicates.

INL facilitated the development of the Namibia Rapid Reference Guide (RRG) on Investigation and Prosecution of Wildlife Crime, which is a summary of the International Consortium on Combating Wildlife Crime (ICCWC) toolkit launched in 2021. It sets out standards that all prosecutors and other entities must apply to all criminal cases

and identifies the relevant ‘points to prove’ to aid investigations and adjudication. Prosecutors, investigators, presiding officers and others in the justice system use the RRG to ensure that wildlife criminals are brought to justice.

With support from INL and Rooikat Trust, a collaborative relationship between police officers (NAMPOL), MEFT investigators, the Office of the Prosecutor General (OPG), customs (NAMRA) and the Financial Intelligence Centre (FIC) has been created to put a proper financial forensic system in place for investigators to “follow the money”. This system has enabled speedy arrests and the disruption of local criminal syndicates and international wildlife crime networks.

A National Environmental Crime Prosecution Unit (ECU), established in the Office of the Prosecutor General, is the first of its kind with two dedicated senior prosecutors mentoring and training prosecutors and investigators across the country. This unit has cleared some of the backlog of cases that have posed a major challenge to the judiciary.

“The ECU has been active in the Zambezi Region and will be working in other parts of the north soon. This alone has made a huge difference in clearing cases and ensuring that wildlife crime is taken more seriously by the courts,” said INL Project Coordinator, Hertha Itembu.

To date, 155 suspects have been charged with the Prevention of Organised Crime Act 29 of 2004. Their names have been submitted to the Financial Intelligence Centre (FIC) for further financial investigations and lifestyle audits.

The fight against poaching continues

Back to the rhino poaching case in Etosha National Park: Approximately one month after the rhino carcasses were found, law enforcement officials had arrested 11 people in connection with the June poaching incidents. Action was coordinated and swift, a testament to the new partnerships and improved investigation procedures developed in Namibia over the past few years.

“In response to the recent discovery of carcasses of poached rhinos in Etosha National Park, law enforcement efforts were intensified and through intelligence-driven operations and investigations, 11 arrests were made in four different incidents in regions adjacent to Etosha,” said MEFT spokesperson Romeo Muyunda.

The goal is ultimately to prevent poaching from ever happening. Partnerships are key to achieving this goal. The projects described here are a few examples of focused, dynamic, cross-cutting efforts that are making an impact in combating wildlife crime. Their success depends

on collaboration among the government ministries of Environment, Forestry and Tourism, of Justice and of Home Affairs, alongside the Namibian Police. Members of the Blue Rhino Task Team, the Save the Rhino Trust rangers and management team, and the communal conservancies’ Rhino Rangers, are at the coalface of this fight and deserve our continued support.

Ultimately the battle against wildlife crime depends upon each of us. If you see something, say something. Speak up. Stand up and join the fight.

Thirty-six Wildlife Protection Rangers attended the SMART Training at Waterberg Law Enforcement training Center.

LET EVERY SCALE COUNT

Using creativity for pangolin conservation

By Liz Komen Namibia Animal Rehabilitation, Research and Education Centre (NARREC).

For the Namibian Pangolin Working Group

Pangolins around the world are highly threatened due to demand for their scales as traditional medicine ingredients in the Far East. Namibia’s only pangolin species – the Temminck’s pangolin – is no exception, and pangolin poaching and illegal trade has become a major concern in recent years for Namibian conservationists.

While Namibia boasts large areas of excellent pangolin habitat, conserving this species requires more than just meeting its ecological requirements. Pangolin conservation requires the whole of Namibian society to care about this vulnerable and rarely seen animal, such that ordinary people are willing to stand against pangolin poaching and trafficking.

Namibian society is multi-cultural, economically unequal, and demographically young. Pangolin conservation must therefore involve the youth across all cultures to create positive perceptions and national pride to effectively counter poaching and illegal trade for short-term financial gains. The future lies in the hands of today’s youth, and their outlook and perceptions are developed through their formal and informal educational experiences.

National efforts to create awareness, prevent or report poaching, and ensure that justice is served to pangolin poachers are led by

the Ministry of Environment, Forestry and Tourism (MEFT) and supported by several non-governmental organisations. In 2020 the Namibian Pangolin Working Group (NPWG) was established to formalise this partnership and increase collaboration among state institutions and organisations that are focused on preventing wildlife crime, conserving and studying pangolins.

The NPWG and MEFT have developed several educational resources relating to biodiversity and pangolin conservation, with funding from the Namibian Chamber of Environment (NCE) and GIZ. These include a poster on the natural history of Temminck’s pangolin, a poster encouraging citizens to report wildlife crime, a comic-book story about a pangolin and a poaching event, and a career guide describing the many professions needed for successful nature conservation. These resources were combined into a highly informative package and sent to secondary school students as part of an invitation to take part in a creative writing project called Let Every Scale Count – Pangolin and Wildlife Crime.

To show how pangolins and wildlife crime relate to the Namibian curriculum, we placed each of the secondary school subjects into one or more environmental pillars: cultural, social, economic, political and natural. We designed an infographic showing the school subjects categorised according to the environmental

Artwork by: Tity Kalala Tshilumba

pillar, a map of the threats and the routes of the illegal international trade, and some ideas for creative story lines. The infographic and aforementioned educational resources were distributed to all combined and secondary schools with an invitation to participate in the Let Every Scale Count creative writing challenge.

According to the 2019 statistics of the Ministry of Education, Arts and Culture (MEAC) there are 624 combined and 221 secondary schools across Namibia’s 14 regions. With endorsement from the MEAC directors and assistance from their distribution officers, we sent the infographic and other resources for the Let Every Scale Count challenge to all 845 schools on the MEAC database.

Students from 36 schools in 11 of Namibia’s 14 regions responded to our invitation and sent in 166 creative stories for our team of judges to read. Selecting the best stories was a difficult process, since there were many excellent and diverse submissions to choose from. Every learner who submitted a story received a certificate of participation as a Biodiversity Ambassador and winners were selected per region and per grade. The range of books awarded as prizes were generously donated by the Rooikat Trust, Namibia Book Market, Wordweaver, The Book Den and Pollination Publishers.

To further encourage the conversation between the arts and the sciences, the NPWG planned and hosted a visual arts exhibition at the Namibia Arts Association’s gallery in Windhoek. Independent artists were invited to submit their artworks for the exhibition under the theme of Let Every Scale Count. Over fifty artworks were submitted and judged by a panel of Namibian art experts. Kenneth /Uiseb, Deputy Director of Wildlife, Monitoring and Research at MEFT and chair of the NPWG, addressed the well-attended opening evening of the exhibition and encouraged all Namibians to play their part in pangolin conservation.

To create a safer world for pangolin and other wildlife species, we must acknowledge and strengthen the interdependence between ecology and society. The arts go hand-in-hand with science. The arts can express the findings of a scientific enquiry in elegant and creative ways that speak to the public imagination. Creating stronger links between the arts and the sciences can potentially foster creative reasoning and crossfertilisation of concepts and stimulate intellectual creativity.

In conservation, the arts can engage the public by creating awareness of the threats that species face and the ways in which everyone can help to reduce those threats. Our experience with linking pangolin conservation to creative school children and adults was highly encouraging, showing that Namibian society is inspired to Let Every Scale Count.

Artwork by: Tity Kalala Tshilumba

Artwork by: Elia Shiwoohamba - Respect the Pangolins of Namibia

Samples of the winners’ creative writing

How young people can stop pangolin poaching and trafficking

A web developer discovers that her dad works for an organisation that traffics and trades pangolins for money. She decides to dig, then she finds lots of information. She goes on to create a website on how to protect, keep pangolins safe, home and keep them at ease.

Jaylee Suarez, 23 years of age, born and raised in Colombia. She’s a full graduate from the University of Colombia. In 2020 she graduated as a computer scientist, but now she does an extra job online as a web developer. Jaylee, her parents and 3 siblings live in a luxurious house in Colombia. Her father Marco is always on air, never home, only visits them 2 or 3 times a month.

He’s a wealthy businessman who’s eager for money and would do anything for it except give his family up. Jaylee noticed her father’s strange behaviour, late night phone calls, staying up all night and barely at home during the day.

One night she snuck into his study, she found a document, it was sealed, written CONFIDENTIAL. She opens the document, discovers that her dad trades pangolins from Africa and works as an associate for a Chinese organisation.

“Uncle Tangeni is a poacher!” Nelao concluded breathlessly as she ran down the path to her house. She went to her father who was harvesting in the field. He asked her what was wrong. “Uncle Tangeni and his friends are burning up the forest!” she said breathlessly, not quite knowing as to where to start. Her father sighed, sat down and put down his big harvesting knife beside him. Nelao dropped on the ground beside him.

“They are killing the pangolins!” she said and pointed in the direction of the forest, and the tears she had tried to hold back sprang out of her eyes.

Her father comforted her. “I tried to talk him out of it, but he did not listen,” he told her.

“We have to do something, father,” she pleaded with him. “He has already started, and he is not planning to quit,” her father told her.

“We need to tell the police,’’ Nelao suggested.

“He is our brother,” her father said in his brother’s defence. “They are our pangolins!” Nelao interjected, almost shouting. “They need our help. We cannot let them die!” She added when her father remained silent.

Nelao and her father went to the police and reported the illegal actions of Tangeni and his friends. They were arrested for pangolin poaching and causing harm to the environment.

Waltraude Philander (Grade 9, Khomas Region):

Natalia Hinamunhu (Grade 12, Omusati Region)

Artwork by: Jodine Strauss - Inner beauty

Taking a pangolin’s view of trafficking

Rosalia Jonas (Grade 9, Otjozondjupa Region):

In the evening I was pulled out of a cage. One of the humans wanted to buy me. I was too frightened to move, I just curled up into a tight ball as my mother taught me. Now I’ll never have babies of my own. I was picked up and put into a bag. Then I heard the voice of Rosalia.

“No! Please don’t kill her, these animals are endangered, please mom help her,” said Rosalia.

Then suddenly I was dropped on the ground. I heard small footsteps coming towards me. “You’re safe now, let’s take you to your new home,” whispered Rosalia. Rosalia’s mom took me to a safe place where there were other animals.

I learned that once humans understand we animals feel safe if they become kind and care for us. I’ll finish my story by saying I met a male, he was so handsome and we fell in love. So I got a baby after all. People came to learn about us so they could tell more children about the animals of Namibia. What a happy way to end my story.

Obert Sianga (Grade 12, //Kharas Region):

A monster (human) came to my cage as it was my turn to be killed. Hopeless me was tired of all the struggle I went through in this short period of time. I was placed on the table where I was supposed to be killed, but all of a sudden, there were continuous sounds like rumbling thunder, the monsters that captured me fled the scene and left us in the room. To my surprise we were rescued by other humans that were very kind and good. I believe they were the conservation group.

They made weird sounds, but I think they were communicating to each other. I was unsure what they wanted to do with us but I knew that we were in safe hands, from there afterwards. But still my heart was broken as I never said my goodbyes to my mom.

I thank these humans for rescuing me and my people. We were taken back to our homes, where I lived for the rest of my life in peace. One thing was clear, there is good within the human race, they can still change for the greater good.

All I have to say to the human nation is, “let every scale count”.

Artwork by: Annelle Zietsman - Mandala

Teagan Cunniffe

A decade of dreams, challenges and achievements

Bridging the gap between tourism and conservation: Celebrating 10 years of TOSCO

By Lara Potma | Images by TOSCO

A group of tourists on safari with Namibia Horse Safari Company in the De Riet community settlement.

In 2012, tour guide Félix Vallat had a dream. He wanted to strengthen the relationship between the tourism industry, in which he worked, and conservationists and communities who needed more support to achieve their aims. That year he founded the Tourism Supporting Conservation Trust , better known as TOSCO. We, the TOSCO team, are celebrating our 10th anniversary this year and take the opportunity to reflect on what we have achieved thus far and focus on where we want to go in future.

Born out of adversity and inspiration

TOSCO was born at a time of adversity, when lions were poisoned in Puros Conservancy in the Kunene Region during 2012. For Félix, this incident highlighted the paradoxical relationship between the tourism sector and local communities when it comes to lions and other iconic, but problem-causing species. Communities were vilified for killing the lions, yet they bore all the costs of living with lions and received none of the benefits that were reaped by the tourism sector.

Inspired by Garth Owen-Smith and Dr. Philip Stander, Félix realised that the tourism sector needed to assist communities who live with wildlife if it wanted to ensure its own long-term viability. With the support of Kunene Conservancy Safaris and Skeleton Coast Safaris, TOSCO started funding three community members – Bertus, Kootie and Colin – in Puros to monitor lion movements and mitigate human-lion conflict. These three were among the first lion rangers employed in Namibia.

Félix’s dream went beyond funding lion rangers, however. “I wanted to create a platform that opened the communication between conservation NGOs, the government, the local communities and the tourism industry,” says Félix, and he also wanted to “increase awareness and education within the tourism industry about conservation matters.”

Garth Owen-Smith (left) was a key mentor for Félix Vallat (right), the founder of TOSCO. Providing salaries and equipment for lion rangers was TOSCO’s first project.

Vehicles are always needed for the annual game counts in the northwest, and TOSCO has assisted with vehicles for every count since 2020.

The TOSCO concept resonated with the tourism industry in Namibia. In the first year alone, 18 additional tourism companies joined TOSCO as paying members, reaching a peak of 42 members in the following years. Ultimate Safaris has been a member from the very beginning. Their co-founder and Managing Director, Tristan Cowley, explains: “We believe in meaningful conservation partnerships, knowing that the more collaboration there is, the better for conservation. As a true conservation travel company, our partnership with TOSCO is just one of those meaningful partnerships that drives conservation for a greater good!”

With no budget for TOSCO’s operating expenses, the organisation initially relied on a team of tourism professionals devoting their free time to their passion of conserving the natural environment. We now support external projects managed by various organisations, while also implementing our own projects to fill critical gaps where needed. All TOSCO projects were undertaken within four main programmes: Living with Wildlife, Awareness, Research and Clean Travel.

The Living with Wildlife Programme supported several human-wildlife conflict-related projects in 10 conservancies and developed the Conservation Contribution concept, which enables tour operators to pay a voluntary fee for their tourism activities on communal land. The Clean Travel Programme started a carbon-offsetting project in 2017 in collaboration with Eloolo Permaculture Initiative, whereby tourism businesses offset their greenhouse gas emissions by supporting the planting and maintenance of trees at selected schools. As part of

the Awareness Programme, TOSCO organised conservation-related workshops, established responsible travel guidelines and placed informative signboards in environmentally sensitive areas. The Research Programme supported scientific researchers who focus on the long-term survival of threatened and endangered wildlife, as well as conservancies for organising annual game counts.

TOSCO’s contribution to conservation

Over the past ten years, more than N$6 million have been collected and disbursed through TOSCO, mostly from the tourism industry through memberships, thus linking travel with direct conservation impact. When asking partners what they value about TOSCO, many of them mentioned our complementary support to other organisations, our flexible and responsive methods, and limited bureaucratic barriers.

As Uakendisa Muzuma, Large Carnivore Coordinator from the Ministry of Environment, Forestry and Tourism, explained, “What currently makes you unique is the way you are aligned, you are not fighting for resources on the ground, you are contributing to the existing structures.”

According to Russell Vinjevold, Integrated Rural Development and Nature Conservation’s (IRDNC) Resource Monitor, “One of TOSCO’s main strengths and achievements is the flexibility and the ability to react fast. So in other words, a lack of bureaucracy, or streamlined systems and processes.

TOSCO is assisting the De Riet community in the Torra Conservancy by funding development projects identified by the community and helping them develop their own tourism infrastructure.

I can call TOSCO for a battery or tyre for a car, and within a day TOSCO would come back and say, ‘yes, we can help you or no, we can’t’. But you get an answer within a day.”

Most importantly, communities at grassroots level have received tangible benefits. “The community of De Riet in Torra conservancy sees TOSCO as a helping hand,” says Lorens Adams, Senior Councillor of the Riemvasmakers Traditional Authority. “TOSCO has helped us in many ways over the years: building an information centre that encourages tourists to visit De Riet for elephant excursions, building a predator-proof kraal to protect our livestock from lions, and installing solar-powered lights. This year TOSCO bought us a new solar water pump, which has helped with our biggest problem: lack of access to water. All of this has allowed the community to make a better life for ourselves.”

Surviving the COVID-19 tourism shutdown

The COVID-19 pandemic had a massive impact on the tourism industry, which resulted in a significant decline in tourism members joining TOSCO. However, determined to continue supporting conservation throughout the crisis and thanks to the major support of the Namibian Chamber of Environment and individual donors that kept us afloat, we adapted to the temporary dip in support from the tourism industry by building stronger partnerships with the government and NGOs.

In early 2020, TOSCO started collaborating with the World Wildlife Fund Namibia to assist with the Wildlife Credits Namibia project. Wildlife Credits creates a platform for businesses to pay for conservation “products”: securing wildlife habitats and corridors, or conserving iconic species that inhabit these landscapes. Payments are used to reward communities as the wildlife stewards for positive conservation outcomes that are independently verified using tourist sightings or technology such as camera traps. This provides

businesses with clear returns for their investment and data for their environmental, social and governance reporting, which is an increasingly important requirement within the corporate sector. TOSCO’s role is to market Wildlife Credits products to the tourism value and supply chains by explaining how the system works and describing the long-term benefits of supporting conservation outcomes for the tourism industry.

Building on our first project, TOSCO has become part of the team that administers the Lion Ranger programme, partnering with conservancies, the Ministry of Environment, Forestry and Tourism (MEFT), and several NGOs. The programme is centred on community-based natural resource management (CBNRM) principles and aims for the adaptive, sustainable management of lions in north-western Namibia, with particular emphasis on human-lion conflict challenges.

Planning the next TOSCO decade

The disruptions in tourism due to the pandemic gave us time to reflect on the past ten years of TOSCO and to prepare for sustainable growth and increased impact over the next ten years. As a result of these reflections, TOSCO has been restructured. Félix Vallat stepped aside as Director and took up the position of Chairperson of the Board. As the new director of operations, I will be looking to increase TOSCO’s paid staff capacity, rather than relying mainly on volunteers as before, as part of our overall transformation strategy.

On the funding side, we endeavour to grow the number of TOSCO members by promoting a better understanding among tourism stakeholders of what responsible tourism entails and extending our platform to include the whole tourism value chain. Operationally, we want to extend our reach beyond the Kunene Region to include other important tourism destinations in Namibia, and areas where tourism needs to be better aligned with conservation.

Building predator-proof kraals is a key aspect of reducing human-lion conflict in the northwest.

In this new decade, TOSCO is replacing the four programme areas with three simplified themes: Climate, Education and Wildlife. We are developing new indicators of success that are integrated with global and national standards that will better measure and monitor the impact that we have on behalf of our members, which they in turn can communicate to their clients. TOSCO will continue to serve as an active and dynamic responsible tourism hub, where members can exchange best practices on responsible travel, where conservation partners can address members with tourism-related matters, and communities can gain more access to tourism benefits.

As tourist preferences change towards more meaningful travel with reduced negative impacts on the destination, we believe that our aim to achieve genuinely responsible tourism will become ever

more important. Travellers are willing to pay more if they know that their money reaches local communities and conservation initiatives where it makes a real difference, and they will increasingly look for tour operators and agents that can guarantee this. TOSCO is in the best position to help Namibian tourism businesses adapt to this positive market shift.

In the first ten years of TOSCO, our team developed a solid understanding of community conservation and forged strong relationships with important conservation players, enabling us to provide the link between these stakeholders and the tourism industry. In return, we help our members gain recognition as responsible tourism businesses among travellers, and serve as the Namibian benchmark for responsible travel.

Becoming a TOSCO Member

We invite tour operators, accommodation providers, car rental companies, activity operators and other businesses linked to Namibian tourism to join our responsible tourism movement. There are five membership categories – Friends of TOSCO, Cheetah, Leopard, Lion and VIP – that vary in price according to the level of recognition you will receive in return. For more details, email info@tosco.org

SEEING LIONS IN A DIFFERENT LIGHT

Lion Rangers and community conservation

Images and text by John Heydinger

Since the late 1990s, desert-adapted lions in north-western Namibia’s Kunene Region have rebounded from a low of approximately 20 individuals to a high of about 180 in 2015. This dramatic recovery coincided with the growth of Namibia’s communal conservancy system and consequent increase in lion prey populations.

The lions’ range expansion and population increase meant that local farmers often paid the price for successful community conservation in the form of livestock losses. One recent survey estimated that the average household living in core lion-range areas lost N$ 37,000 worth of livestock to lions alone during the time when lion numbers reached their peak.

Namibia’s communal conservancies – now numbering 86 across the country – are considered to be among the world’s most highlyregarded examples of successful community-based natural resource management (CBNRM). Namibia’s CBNRM programme grants people living on communal lands conditional ownership over the wildlife on those lands, which allows them to manage the wildlife and benefit economically from its presence. However, lions and other large and damage-causing wildlife have proven an awkward fit within the CBNRM system. Because lions are specially protected, the Namibian government makes the ultimate decisions on how lions are managed, which undermines the case for community ownership of this species. The community benefits associated with lions (e.g. through tourism) are generally too low to cover the high costs suffered by individual households.

Recognising these shortfalls, the Ministry of Environment, Forestry and Tourism (MEFT) and its NGO partners – Integrated Rural Development and Nature Conservation (IRDNC) and the Desert Lion Conservation Trust – activated the Lion Rangers programme in 2017. Russell Vinjevold, Dr. Philip Stander, and Dr. John Heydinger took the lead in working with core lion-range conservancies to identify, train, and equip local people as the first Lion Rangers. Their primary duties were monitoring lions, warning farmers of lion presence, and mitigating lion-related conflict within their conservancies.

In early 2018, the first group of 11 Lion Rangers representing the Anabeb, Puros and Sesfontein conservancies convened at Wêreldsend Environmental Centre to kick off the programme. The first training course focused on the rangers’ roles and responsibilities and on responding to an ongoing lion conflict incident in nearby Anabeb Conservancy. Since that time, and with the support of the International Union for the Conservation of Nature (IUCN), the Community Conservation Fund of Namibia (CCFN) and Tourism Supporting Conservation (TOSCO), the Lion Rangers programme has grown to include 49 rangers representing 11 conservancies in the Kunene Region, including those employed by TOSCO and the Namibian Lion Trust.

The key question is: how do these rangers address the challenges of lions within the CBNRM system? The most important aspect of their work is incorporating local perspectives into lion conservation and conflict management. Extensive social surveys revealed that livestock owners in Kunene consider lions to be fearsome, destructive and increasing in numbers.

Fearsome, destructive and increasing Lions are considered fearsome because they pose a threat to people’s safety and lives. According to one Anabeb Conservancy farmer, “Lions are coming to the house. Even in the morning when you are coming out of the house you will see the tracks there, next to the fire… you are afraid, just to move around.” Another from Puros Conservancy said, “Lions are very dangerous… We must be careful. We must be safe.” These feelings are part of a long history of lions attacking humans in Kunene. Stories of such attacks, though overwhelmingly representing a bygone era, still circulate freely and many farmers have personally experienced frightening lion encounters.

Lions are considered destructive because they can compromise farmer’s livelihoods – a direct challenge to the foundation of CBNRM, which is meant to produce economic benefits alongside communal proprietorship of natural resources. Said one conservancy farmer, “The problem with lions… they come and kill someone’s cattle that they are living from.” Another, looking towards an increasingly empty kraal said, “I am becoming poor because of lions.” In recent years there have been numerous well-documented cases of lions destroying entire herds of sheep and goats, usually within kraals. These incidents increase poverty levels in one of Namibia’s poorest constituencies.

To those sympathetic to lion conservation efforts, it may be surprising that many Kunene farmers consider lion numbers to be increasing. Said one conservancy leader, “In the past the cattle were sleeping in the field but now they cannot because the lion population is high”. This perception is consistently repeated. By contrast, the Namibian public are familiar with well-worn concerns stemming from activist organisations in the press and on social media that the desert-adapted lions are “disappearing” or “facing extinction.” How can these two perceptions – local farmers’ concerns that lion numbers are increasing versus activist concerns that the lions may disappear – be squared? The reason is that these perceptions are working on different timeframes.

Social surveys indicate that farmers often compare lion numbers to those prior to the establishment of conservancies. Said one Torra Conservancy farmer, “Before the conservancy, wild animals were killed. When the conservancy was established, they said the predators shouldn’t be killed… Now, conservancies have come in and decided, ‘no, we won’t kill wild animals anymore’… that is a problem.”

Prior to independence, apartheid legislation confined communal farmers to a marginal existence beyond the care of the government. Government disinterest in local welfare forced farmers to take matters into their own hands. This led to high levels of wildlife destruction on communal lands, as many people struggled to survive the combination of racist policies and drought during the 1980s. During that period lions disappeared from the Kunene Region almost entirely. Since then, lion numbers have increased in response to increasing prey

populations and better protection afforded by conservancies. Lawabiding farmers know that they cannot kill lions as before, as it is only permitted in response to direct threats to their lives or livelihoods.

In contrast, pages on social media strive to raise money for desertadapted lion conservation, worrying that the “desert[-adapted] lions are vanishing day by day” and that “their existence is running out.” Such declines are likely considered relative to high numbers of desertadapted lions reported during the mid-2010s, when the population was estimated to be as high as 180 individuals. However, no comprehensive population estimate of lions in north-western Namibia, west of Etosha, has ever been scientifically performed. Although it is the best available estimate, this figure is based on extrapolated data coming primarily from Palmwag Concession.

Population trends are thus relative to the baseline estimate you use, while the accuracy of any estimate is influenced by the methods used for counting and extrapolation. Based upon extensive monitoring by the Lion Rangers since 2018, as of early 2022, lion numbers in Kunene have declined since the mid-2010s, though they remain well above their minimums of the 1990s. More pertinently, the population appears secure and resilient to recent challenges stemming from drought and conflict with farmers.

This conclusion is primarily based upon a short-term assessment of the population, performed in mid-2021 by MEFT, the Lion Rangers and partnering organisations. During this assessment, spanning core lionrange in Kunene, as many individual lions as possible were identified and records were submitted to MEFT. Yet the resulting estimate was not indicative of a full count, so MEFT requested the first-ever comprehensive Kunene lion population survey, taking place during November and December 2022.

Based upon the existing Conservancy Game Guards concept, and adapting the success of Namibia’s Rhino Rangers, the Lion Rangers are community conservationists who link farmers and their communities to research, policy, and management interventions. The upcoming lion population survey is being implemented applying ranger-centred methods. Drawing on the rangers’ extensive experience in tracking and individually identifying lions, this population survey aims to identify every single lion over the age of two in the northwest, using a repeatable community-centred approach. In addition to providing the first science-based, transparent approach to estimating lion numbers in Kunene, the survey will build capacity among rangers as conservation and research leaders within their communities.

There is an increasing realisation across Africa that lion conservation needs to include local communities that live with lions. As the Lion Rangers take part in the population survey and become ever more familiar with individual lions, they can share this information with their communities. In doing so, lions may come to be seen less as simply fearsome, destructive and increasing, but rather as individuals within a well-understood population, known and managed primarily by local communities. This approach reinforces the underpinnings and goals of CBNRM by placing communities at the centre of lion conservation.

To find out more about the Lion Rangers programme, visit lionrangers.org.

GETTING TO KNOW NAMIBIA WITH TWO EYE-CATCHING

NEW ATLASES

By Gail C. Thomson

How well do you know Namibia? Did you know that Ongwediva means “where leopards drink” or that Omatako means “buttocks”? Do you know what makes Namibia so dry, or why the coastal waters are so rich in marine life? Do you want to know more about the mountains, waters, diverse landscapes, plants, animals and people of Namibia? Then the 390-page, informationpacked, beautifully illustrated Atlas of Namibia: its land, water and life should be at the top of your wish list.

This is the third Atlas of Namibia, following on from the National Atlas of South West Africa (Namibia) published in 1983 and the Atlas of Namibia: A portrait of the land and its people published in 2002 The new atlas builds on previous work and introduces new topics and information generated in the 20 years since the last atlas. With 200 more pages than its predecessor, the new atlas is a major update that will expand the depth and breadth of your knowledge.

The four compiling authors, John and Martin Mendelsohn, Tony Robertson and Alice Jarvis, distilled their own information and the combined knowledge of over 40 contributors into a book that tells a coherent story. This story is enhanced with over 200 maps of Namibia, hundreds of other illustrative graphics and over 450 high quality photographs. Carmen Begley (layout designer) and Carole Roberts (copyeditor) complete the team that produced a visually stunning and highly readable book.

The atlas takes the reader on a journey of Namibia from the ground up. The first few chapters cover landforms and geology, climate, water and soil – physical features that in many ways dictate the patterns of living things found in later chapters: vegetation, wildlife, land use, people and their livelihoods. Each chapter starts by putting Namibia into context within regional and global scales, progressing through to detailed information about particular landforms, ecosystems, species, or human activities and livelihoods in different parts of the country.

The atlas is accessible to a broad audience. It is based on the latest information about each topic it covers. Since the last atlas, a large amount of information has been produced through scientific research and citizen science from within Namibia and beyond. Many of the Namibian sources referenced here are stored online in the Namibian Environmental Information Service, which is freely available to the public.

Researchers, students and scholars will find the ten pages of notes and references near the back of the Atlas to be a good starting point for delving deeper into their area of interest. For the more casual reader, the photographs and descriptions of unusual landforms, natural ecosystems and diverse ways of life arouse wanderlust to experience more of this beautiful country.

At the same time the very first Namibian atlas for children was produced, based on some of the information in the 2022 Atlas. Titled My Children’s Picture Atlas of Namibia, this 40-page atlas by Hilma Weber, Clare Galloway and John Mendelsohn is a visual guide to Namibia that can be used in the classroom or at home.

Hand drawn maps and detailed illustrations by Allan Kennedy show political regions, constituencies and towns, along with Namibia’s diverse population groups, animals, geography and natural resources. Namibian children are introduced to neighbouring countries, the concept of tourism and the country’s location on the globe. A set of questions is provided at the end of the book to help initiate discussion between children and their teachers or parents.

Both atlases are highly attractive publications that spark interest in all aspects of Namibian geography. Together, they run the gamut from answering simple questions that a child could ask through to providing information that a researcher would find useful. The teams of people who worked on each publication have produced attractive and informative books to be enjoyed by Namibians and visitors, young and old.

More details about the Atlas of Namibia and My Children’s Picture Atlas of Namibia

Atlas of Namibia: its land, water and life was published by the Namibia Nature Foundation (NNF). NNF and Ongava Research Centre co-managed the project, which was funded by the German Development Agency, GIZ. The 2022 Atlas is now available at bookshops across Namibia. The entire atlas is freely available online at www.atlasofnamibia.online, while a PDF version and many of the sources referenced can be found at www.the-eis.com/elibrary

The second edition of My Children’s Picture Atlas of Namibia was published by the Development Workshop Namibia (DWN) and will be available as a hardcopy in Namibian bookshops. As part of its Early Childhood Development project, DWN is donating hundreds of these books to schools in informal settlements across Namibia. The first edition (28 pages), produced by DWN with funding from the Namibian telecoms company MTC, the European Union and the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF), can be downloaded for free at www.dw-namibia.org/publications.php

Castor oil bushes near Tsumeb investigated by Petra Mutota.

THE BATTLE AGAINST INVASIVE ALIEN SPECIES IN NAMIBIA

Invasive Alien Working Group

By Shirley Bethune, Lucrensia Ndeilitunga, Petra Mutota

Invasive alien plants and animals are one of the five major threats to global biodiversity. These are defined as non-indigenous species that adapt well to conditions where they are introduced and then spread or flourish rapidly, often in the absence of their natural enemies. If nothing is done to reduce the spread or eradicate these species, they can take over large pieces of agricultural and protected land, cause disease or injuries to both livestock and wildlife, negatively affect indigenous plants and animals, and ultimately damage native ecosystems.

Gunhild Voigts

In Namibia, 38 trees or large shrubs, 62 forbs (flowering plants) and several grasses are considered invasive alien plants, 15 of which pose serious economic and ecological threats. Many of the invasive shrubs are cactus species that flourish in Namibia’s arid environments, while aquatic weeds can choke the few permanent water sources in the country. Dry riverbeds and other disturbed areas are particularly vulnerable to invasion, which diminishes groundwater.

Several invasive alien animal species have been recorded in Namibia, including seven fishes, three reptiles, four birds, four snails, one crayfish, two mussels and seven mammals. Eleven of these are considered serious threats to our native species. Besides outcompeting local species for space and resources (often the main threat), some invasive alien animals are similar enough to our native animals to interbreed with them and thus pose a genetic problem.

Winning the battle against invasive alien species requires a multipronged strategy that involves the public, government, and nongovernmental partners. Most of the work until now has focused on controlling plant species, since these are currently a bigger problem for Namibia than the animal species. The four main prongs of this strategy are: 1) creating public awareness of the problem; 2) mapping the current distribution of invasive aliens; 3) manually removing problematic species; 4) deploying biological control agents.

Creating awareness

Public awareness requires providing accurate information to the public using as many outlets and formats as possible. Popular articles, books and book chapters, posters and lectures have all been used to explain why invasive alien species are a problem and what the public can do to help. It is especially important that people do not unwittingly plant invasives in their gardens or release invasive animals into the wild (e.g. releasing fish into a dam or river).

The Botanical Society of Namibia has taken the lead in creating awareness by producing the Nasty Nine – Alien Invasive Species poster and a series of factsheets containing more detailed information. The Tree Atlas of Namibia, Trees and Shrubs of Namibia (2009 and 2018 editions) and the 2022 edition of the Atlas of Namibia all include sections on invasive alien plants. The Botanical Society is currently preparing information and maps on their website to highlight some of the most problematic plant species and areas of Namibia that are particularly vulnerable to plant invasion.

Identifying and mapping invasive alien plants

Another way in which the public can help in the battle against invasive species is to record sightings of these plants by using the Atlasing in Namibia mobile application. The app includes clear photographs and brief descriptions of 36 invasive alien plant species to help users identify the species of concern. Verified records are then shown on maps on the atlasing part of the Environmental Information System (www.the-eis.com). These maps allow conservationists to identify invasive hotspots, keep track of the spread of species and develop plans for controlling them.

To complement the app, a clearly illustrated field guide with preliminary maps of an expanded list of the 50 most invasive or potentially invasive alien plants in Namibia was prepared by Petra Mutota, an Honours student at the Namibia University of Science and Technology (NUST), with the assistance of Coleen Mannheimer and Ben Strobach. A poster

covering the same species has also been produced. The field guide and poster will be published once funding is secured.

Manually controlling invasive plants

The Cactus Clean-Up team, led by Gunhild Voigts, regularly clears stands of cacti and other alien plants around Windhoek. This enthusiastic team has managed to clear invasive cacti in several areas and has persuaded many gardeners to plant non-invasive indigenous plants rather than cacti (see text box for more information). Other more sporadic initiatives in the city and elsewhere in Namibia tend to be undertaken by volunteers, rangers in our national parks, municipalities and youth from schools, environmental clubs and environmental education centres, often as part of the President’s annual clean-up day. The 3rd Windhoek Scouts have organised several invasive alien clearing days around Avis Dam.

Biological Control

Biological control (or biocontrol) involves introducing specifically identified natural enemies of the targeted invasive alien species. To ensure that these natural enemies do not become invasive, they are rigorously tested in hermetically sealed laboratory conditions, usually for at least three years, before they are introduced to the alien plants in the field. For plants, most biological control agents are insects that attack particular plant species, thus preventing the plant’s growth and reducing its ability to reproduce and spread.

The earliest attempt at biological control of an invasive alien plant in Namibia targeted Kariba weed (Salvinia molesta), first recorded in the Zambezi River in 1948. By the 1960s it made headlines when dense mats formed on the newly impounded Kariba Dam. Ten years later similar mats were blocking channels in the Eastern Zambezi (formerly Caprivi) wetlands, interfering with the movement of boats and reducing fish catches. These mats block the sunlight needed by submerged plants and as the weeds decay they deplete the oxygen available for fish and other aquatic species.

In the early 1980s, 644 weevils of the specific species known to attack Kariba weed were imported from Australia, where they had been thoroughly tested, and used effectively. By 1998, 98% of the sites were free of the weed. Today, some plants are still found on the edges of lakes and rivers, but they are no longer a problem and insects can be quickly released if the weed gets out of control again.

In the mid-1980s, a cochineal insect was introduced to Namibia from South Africa to control the sweet prickly pear cactus (Opuntia ficusindica), which had become a major problem particularly in the Otavi mountain area. The cochineal was highly effective and today this cactus is at such a low population level in that area that it is not of ecological concern.

More than thirty years after these success stories, in 2019, the Botanical Society and the Namibian Chamber of the Environment (NCE) received government permission (environmental clearance certificate and phytosanitary import permit) to import from South Africa and release three biocontrol agents to target three particularly invasive cactus species. Two cochineal insect species targeted the imbricated or devil’s rope cactus (Cylindropuntia imbricata) and the common pest pear cactus (Opuntia stricta) respectively, while a mealybug species was released on the midnight lady or snake cactus (Harrisia pomanensis).

Dr Iain Paterson from the Centre of Biological Control of Rhodes University in South Africa brought the biocontrol agents and demonstrated how to release these species at two selected sites in Windhoek.

In the three years since then, Lucrensia Ndeilitunga, Aktofel Elago and Monica Nande, NUST students funded by the Botanical Society and Rhodes University, have been monitoring the effectiveness of the cochineal insects and moving them from one cactus stand to another when necessary (these insects cannot move over large cactus-free areas).

The results for the cochineal biocontrol agent on the devil’s rope cactus have been mixed. The insect takes time to become established, especially on woody old cacti, on plants growing on steep slopes and in areas that are too exposed or are vulnerable to flooding. After two years, 90-100% of the cladodes (the fleshy cactus “leaves”) on most of this cactus species were covered by the cochineal insects at seven of the ten study sites. The number of small cactus plants had been drastically reduced and any remaining small plants were covered in cochineal. By mid-2022, most plants were reduced in height by 5-20 cm at the seven sites where the cochineal is well established.

Despite the success recorded to date for most of the study sites, we cannot afford to become complacent. In August 2022, the researchers were surprised and disappointed to find that the cactus stands at the original release site had started to recover and are growing strongly with low infestation rates. The likely causes were a combination of intense rain early in 2022 and abnormally severe frost this winter. The absence of small plant regrowth from dropped cladodes indicates that the biocontrol is working. It also shows that ongoing monitoring is important and that reinfestation with the biocontrol insect may be necessary from time to time.

Now that many of the cacti at the survey sites are well covered by cochineal, the next step is to combine manual and biological control by felling the large cacti and leaving their cochineal infested remains at the site. Thus, the biocontrol insect will continue infecting the smaller plants, while our monitoring exercises continue to keep track of their progress.

Next steps: developing a strategy and action plan

A more concerted, integrated approach is needed to fully control the spread of invasive alien species across Namibia. NCE therefore invited those with experience and interest in the control of invasive alien species, from government, local authorities, NGOs and academia, to discuss a strategy to address invasive alien species.

All agreed on the need for an Action Plan for invasive alien species with four clear components:

1) preventing the import of invasive and potentially invasive alien species into Namibia; 2) stopping the spread of existing invasive species within Namibia; 3) actively managing, controlling or eradicating (where possible) these species; and 4) establishing an inclusive institutional mechanism to implement the plan.

The Invasive Alien Species Working Group will be established to allow cooperation among all of the key role players that will be implementing these activities. As it involves the government and all non-governmental organisations working on this problem, the Working Group will coordinate activities and seek joint funding to implement the action plan. By joining forces and reaching out to the public for help, we are taking the battle against invasive alien species to the next level.

Lucrensia Ndeilitunga counting cladodes with the cochineal biocontrol agent released in Windhoek.

Shirley Bethune

Gunhild Voigts

Prosopis trees have outcompeted all of the indigenous vegetation in this riverbed and, due to their high density, are using large amounts of groundwater.

Fighting alien invasion in Windhoek (by Gunhild Voigts, Cactus Clean-Up)

The entire City of Windhoek is not my own private property, nor is it yours, nor is it private property of the City of Windhoek. Together we share the responsibility for our urban environment. This includes joining the battle against invasive alien plant species.

The biocontrol agents released in Windhoek currently target only two of many problematic plant species, but we have found that their effectiveness varies from place to place. Even where the insects have been highly effective, manual control is needed to clear the dead cacti from the problem areas. Manual removal remains our main weapon against all of the other species and on sites where the biocontrol agents are not working.

Past endeavours to cut down the cacti were ineffective because there was no coordinated approach, thus allowing the plants to return when the work stopped. In November 2015, a number of retired Windhoek residents came together to organise and finance a more sustained effort through the Cactus Clean-Up initiative. We removed aliens wherever we could and offered employment to job seekers to clear large areas whenever funds were available.

Cactus Clean-Up has cleared many parts of Windhoek from damaging vegetation, especially open spaces owned by the City of Windhoek, but also roadsides and private properties. With our current resources we have tackled many species of cacti, rubber vine (Cryptostegia grandiflora), thorn apple species (Datura species), prickly poppy (Argemone species) and fountain grass (Pennisetum setaceum).

Clearing invasive alien species in Windhoek remains a huge challenge and we cannot do it alone. You can participate by learning to identify the worst alien invaders and removing them from your garden and surroundings. The EIS photo guide of alien plants is a good place to start learning (see link below). Never plant any of the species on this list in your garden!

The City of Windhoek’s extra effort to clear alien species on World Environment Day was a great initiative, but we should all make alien removals an everyday habit. If this environmental threat is neglected for too long then our community will have a disaster on its hands. We have no other planet to go to, so let’s join hands in fighting to save the one we have!

For the photo guide to invasive alien plants visit: www.the-eis.com/atlas/?q=photo-guide-to-alien-plants

NUST cactus control team collecting cladodes with cochineal to spread to new stands.

Shirley Bethune

Control options for Prosopis trees and shrubs (by Dr Ben Strohbach and Shirley Bethune, NUST)

Prosopis trees were initially introduced into southern Africa (and many other arid areas of the world) because of their drought tolerance, potential to produce fuel wood, timber, and highly nutritious pods that are used as livestock fodder. One of the main methods of Prosopis seed distribution is through animal dung. Since then, these tree species (there are four in Namibia) have spread along dry and perennial watercourses, threatening native vegetation and using vast amounts of precious groundwater.

If farmers still want to use the pods as fodder but prevent the further spread of Prosopis on their land, they need to collect and crush the pods before feeding them to animals. This requires buying a hammermill and diligently collecting the pods rather than allowing animals to eat them where they fall. Thus, money and extra labour is needed.

The second option is the use of two seed-eating beetle or bean weevil species (in the Bruchidae family) as biocontrol. These have established well in South Africa and have destroyed up to 75% of the Prosopis seed crop in the country. This form of biological control was tested in Namibia in the 1990s, but no information is available on the results of these trials.

Prosopis has been successfully controlled in Yemen and Niger through harvesting for firewood. In Namibia, however, a pilot community project in Gibeon showed that people buying firewood prefer local woods (primarily Acacia) rather than Prosopis. Another problem found during the pilot project was the ability of Prosopis to coppice, or resprout from the stump, after the tree is cut down. Removal of the stumps also proved to be problematic, as Prosopis is well-rooted. Even saplings proved difficult to remove.

Until recently, the remaining option was the use of arboricides (tree poisons). These broad-spectrum herbicides are unselective (also kill indigenous tree species), water-soluble, toxic to fish and wildlife, and potentially carcinogenic to humans. These chemicals can persist in the soil for months or even years, and pollute groundwater. The use of these poisons, however carefully applied, is therefore not recommended.

Recent genetic research has improved our understanding of the phytogenetic links between different Prosopis, and split them into four genera, placing ours in a new genus, Neltuna. But more importantly this work has aided the task of selecting more targeted, specific biocontrol agents, with several that show promise.

Early biocontrol studies on Prosopis focussed on control agents that damage the seeds or pods, thereby aiming to reduce the spread by reducing seed viability but retaining the “useful” value of the trees to farmers as shade, fodder, timber, and fuelwood. Recent global satellite imagery has, however, made it clear just how fast Prosopis is spreading, and how dense and impenetrable these thickets can be, while groundwater studies in South Africa show that these much denser stands deplete groundwater resources up to six times faster than the naturally more widely spaced indigenous trees do. Thus, scientists recommend a shift from the old compromise between spread and value to eradication of the trees.

The most recent review plainly states that there is no other route than biocontrol to successfully control and manage Prosopis. Our emphasis here in Namibia should also be to join this shift towards achieving effective biocontrol by testing control agents that harm the growth and leaves of the trees, and thereby achieve the same results as the arboricides more safely, if not as quickly.

Honorable Deputy Minister Lucia Witbooi visiting cactus-fighters at work removing Datura seed capsules.

Aktofel Elago and Shirley Bethune surveying and removing cactus regrowth two years after clearing in Eros.

Gunhild Voigts

Lucrensia Ndeilitunga

NAMIBIAN YOUTH IN CONSERVATION ARE READY TO

SHAPE OUR FUTURE

By Siphiwe Lutibezi and Ingelore Katjingisiua, WWF-Namibia

Images by WWF Namibia

Earth Hour is the world’s largest environmental grassroots movement, inspiring millions of people to take action for our planet and nature. It started in Sydney, Australia, as a lights-out event in 2007 and has continued to grow. In 2022, 192 countries participated in Earth Hour, raising awareness about various environmental issues. Global landmarks such as the Sydney Opera House, the Colosseum in Rome, the Eiffel Tower in Paris, and the Empire State Building in New York City took part by symbolically switching off lights to support the movement.

In Namibia, we took the idea of Earth Hour to the next level by using it to actively include the youth in conservation. WWF Namibia and partners in the Namibian Association of CBNRM Support Organisations (NACSO) reached out to 57 young adults from the Kunene North & South, North Central, and the Zambezi regions, representing 23 communal conservancies. While the initial activities were associated with Earth Hour events, the positive response from these young people has presented an opportunity to grow a youth movement for conservation in Namibia.

Earth Hour activities and reflections

Young people are crucial to advancing development, social change, economic growth, and innovation. The 2022 Earth Hour theme Shape Our Future is to make that future a reality.

Conservation activities are not always presented to the youth in a manner they can easily absorb or get excited about. Since all the young people we engaged with during Earth Hour come from communal conservancies, we ignited their enthusiasm by initially focusing on community-based natural resource management (CBNRM). Our field partners – Integrated Rural Development and Nature Conservation, the Namibia Development Trust and the Namibia Nature Foundation – took the youth through the first NACSO training unit for game guards: Know Your Conservancy. This unit provides a comprehensive introduction to CBNRM, conservancies, and the role they can play within conservancies as young people. With this information, the youth felt more confident to engage with conservancy management and learn more about conservation in their respective areas.

As part of the Earth Hour event, the youth actively participated in various inspirational activities and games that demonstrated their assets, skills and abilities. While most participants are currently unemployed, they discovered that they already possessed leadership, active listening, communication, and innovation skills that they could use within their conservancies. Having gained further confidence through these activities, the youth were inspired to become agents of change for conservation by pledging to take action under four stewardship themes: Nature, Environmental Education, Youth and Gender Equality.

For the Nature theme, they pledged to “look after the environment and conserve natural resources,” which is especially applicable for young people in communal conservancies. Under the Environmental Education theme, they committed themselves “to learn and gain knowledge as well as raise awareness” among their peers and families regarding the importance of the environment. Natasha Gomes from //Huab conservancy said, “I want to teach my fellow youth about the importance of nature and that we can live in harmony with the wild and enjoy and use natural resources sustainably.”

Their pledges under the Youth and Gender Equality themes were to “engage and mobilise other young people to participate in conservation actively” and “ensure equality and equity for women, men and youth,” respectively. “I choose to be a steward for youth and to be the voice of the youth, motivating and teaching them what we should do during our era and how we can shape our future now and for future generations,” said Simataa Sibongo of the Kabulabula Conservancy. Many young people recognise that the little things they do now affect their future and generations to follow.

The final element of the Earth Hour training was the introduction of the Wild Landscape Biodiversity App as a pilot project to test whether the youth would be willing and able to collect biodiversity data in communal conservancies. This is the first time young conservancy members have been given the opportunity to collect such valuable scientific data, designed to complement the existing National Atlasing App and data collected by game guards using Event Books. The youth at our training events felt empowered and willing to take on the responsibility entrusted to them. They were committed to making the Wild Landscapes Biodiversity app pilot a success so that other youth may also get an opportunity to participate.

From Earth Hour to youth in conservation

The pledges made during the Earth Hour events were not empty promises, as we found out through follow-up conversations with these young people several months afterwards.

Vichale Shikongo from the !Khoro !Goreb Conservancy, as a steward for Environmental Education and Nature, organised a three-day elephant conflict mitigation workshop for ten youth in her conservancy to teach them about the importance of elephants for both people and the environment, and, on a practical level, how to protect water points and gardens in order to live with elephants. She is looking forward to continued engagements and uplifting the youth in her conservancy.

Hambeleleni Ananias, a steward for Nature in the Uukwaluudhi Conservancy, held meetings to raise awareness of the impact of deforestation in the community. She also co-facilitated the conservancy consultation meetings for the development of the human-wildlife conflict (HWC) management action plan at a key HWC hotspot centre in Amaupa.

Ronny Simasiku, a steward for Nature, planted indigenous and fruit trees with family members in the Impalila Conservancy. He planted seedlings in plastic bottles that he picked up while cleaning the area. Ronny is also educating school children not to litter by explaining to them that litter affects both small and big creatures in the environment.

Tjatjiza Thom from the Ombazu Conservancy, a steward for Youth and Nature, gathered five other young people to start working in the local garden. She has also encouraged them to use their own skills, and some of them have come up with great craft ideas to sell at local markets and to tourists.

In the Sorris Sorris Conservancy, Knowledge Uri-Khob who is a steward for Nature, went out to sensitise farmers in the conservancy about the negative effects of uncontrolled veld fires on biodiversity and on their livestock. He urged them to carefully put out cigarette butts, especially when they are in the field herding livestock.

The youth further demonstrated their commitment to conservation by collecting local biodiversity data within their respective conservancies using the new Biodiversity App. Besides recording mammal sightings, much of their data included animals that are not systematically recorded in conservancies – butterflies, amphibians, bats and reptiles. To help the young people record the sightings, 43 smartphones were distributed to youth from 28 conservancies. Each time they saw an animal in one of the categories, they took

a photo of it and recorded the location. This information was sent to experts who could verify the species in the photograph and add the information to a database and a map. Importantly, each sighting includes the name of the person recording, which is an important form of recognition of the young people’s voluntary contributions to biodiversity information in Namibia.

During the first three-month period from the end of March to June, a total of 380 sightings were recorded, of which only 14 were not identifiable. Victoria Tjirundu from the Otjindjerese Conservancy collected the most data of all the youth that had been trained. Kebby Sakuyamba from the Mayuni Conservancy took amazing photos of species in the different categories using the smartphone. He says, “through the app, I’ve learnt a lot about different species that I didn’t know before and why they are important for our environment.”

Plans for the future

Earth Hour’s Shape Our Future theme was an opportunity to inspire change by starting with the youth who see themselves as

the leaders of now and tomorrow. Without the youth in communal conservation areas actively engaged in conservation, communal conservancies will lack leadership and direction in the future. To take up this leadership role, young people must be engaged, empowered, and provided with skills needed in the context of community conservation and sustainable development.

The enthusiasm and results generated by the youth in the months after Earth Hour have inspired us to help young people in Namibian conservancies establish their movement and support networks to unlock their full potential in conservation. Starting with the initial group of trainees and expanding to include young people in conservancies across the country, WWF Namibia and our partner institutions are working towards supporting a Youth in Conservation network.

After the successful pilot phase, the Biodiversity App and data management systems behind it will be further refined and fully integrated into existing data collection systems in Namibia. At a national level, it will feed into the Namibian Atlasing project and be incorporated into the annual State of Community Conservation Report. At the level of conservancies and villages, the young people can use the App and its associated data to inspire their peers and raise awareness within their communities.

“I am the voice of Namibian conservation,” said Jonna Bobby Iitengula from the Iipumbu ya Tshilongo Conservancy. A statement that continues to echo through the youth in actions and responsibility long after Earth Hour ends, giving us much hope for the future of Youth in Conservation.

BIG BIRDS, BIG POWER LINES, BIG PROBLEMS

By John Pallett

Every time we use electricity from the national power grid, we are complicit in the death of thousands of birds. The power lines that criss-cross our country, and the rest of the world, are death traps for many bird species. Electrocution is one hazard, but a more vexing problem is collision when an unsuspecting bird meets a horizontal wire directly in its line of flight.

The deadly impact of these large, ubiquitous structures on birds has been recognised for many decades now, yet it remains a particularly difficult problem to solve. The demand for electricity is accelerating in our technological world, which will exact an increasingly heavy toll on the birds that share the airspace occupied by transmission lines. We cannot halt society’s energy demands, but nor can we ignore the plight of so many birds. How do we resolve this terrible conundrum?

During one year of monitoring a range of power lines in southern Namibia, we recorded carcasses of bustards, korhaans, flamingos, secretary birds, martial eagles, lappet-faced and white-backed vultures, as well as a variety of smaller birds down to the size of a sparrow. Elsewhere in southern Africa, cranes are a particular concern, and the literature includes a long list of other species including many wetland birds and iconic species such as the bearded vulture. Many of the birds most prone to power line collisions in southern Africa are listed as threatened species; it is likely that power lines are a leading cause of their decline.

When it comes to collisions, bustards are amongst the worst hit. The kori bustard has the distinction of being the world’s heaviest

flying bird, but at the same time it is clumsy in the air with poor manoeuvrability, and is consequently one of the most frequent victims of power lines. Ludwig’s and Denham’s bustards are similarly affected. Systematic surveys along power lines in the Karoo show that endangered Ludwig’s bustards are killed on transmission lines at a rate of one bird per kilometre per year, which amounts to 47,000 birds annually. For a species with a small population confined to the drier parts of south-western Africa, this mortality rate is surely a major threat to its survival.

The size and height of power lines depends on the voltage they carry; studies reveal that higher voltage lines kill more birds than lower ones. High capacity 220 kV power lines are set up on typical steel lattice towers. Three pairs of parallel electrical cables are vertically separated from each other, with a fourth earth wire above them. These four sets of wires make a curtain about 16 metres deep – the top earth wire is typically 28 metres above the ground, while the lowest wires sag to 12 metres above ground at the midpoint between the towers. Think of a kori bustard flapping along at about 15 metres above ground: the moment it sees the wires ahead, it must climb to about 30 metres to clear the topmost conductor. Often that’s impossible.

Carcasses of bustards and other birds underneath power lines.

A kori bustard that smashed headlong into four conductors (all the same phase, so close together in a bundle) of the lowest hanging wires on a 400 kV power line.

Power lines that carry a lower voltage are smaller, and the cables are closer together, so they are both lower in total height and they create a smaller curtain of danger for birds. On the smallest lines, the cables are in a horizontal plane and they do not necessarily have earth wires, thus presenting a smaller obstacle to approaching birds. While these smaller lines take out fewer birds than the larger ones, they are still highly problematic. For example, a 66 kV line in the southern Namib killed 11 Ludwig’s bustards over a distance of 70 km in a three-month period. The bustards had concentrated in this area to feed on a temporary flush of desert grass and insects. Consequently, any size of power line is a hazard for these birds.

At this point, you may be wondering: why do birds hit power lines, can’t they see them? For us, the conductors are clearly visible. But remember, bustards often fly in low light when moving to and from foraging grounds, and in the case of flamingos, their long-distance flights are at night. Relatively few collisions occur close to the towers, so we can deduce that most birds see them and take avoiding action. But the cables between the towers lie horizontally, and if you are travelling at roughly the same level and thus viewing them against a dark background, instead of the sky, they are far less visible.

Bustards are even more vulnerable than other birds because their eyes are on the sides of their heads, and they are probably looking partially downwards while in flight, so they are actually blind to anything straight in front of them. In an evolutionary sense this was never a disadvantage because they are open-country birds that do not navigate through a three-dimensional landscape like birds in a savannah or woodland. Whatever the explanation, it is clear that the birds are not detecting the power lines in time to take evasive action. What can be done about it?

Solutions to this vexing issue have largely concentrated on attaching various flapping or coiled devices to the topmost conductor, to make them more conspicuous. These bird flight diverters have been successful in reducing crane mortalities (by an estimated 92%), and roughly halve the mortality rates for several other species. Unfortunately, the results of this method have been disappointing for bustards.

To make matters worse, installation of these devices is extremely costly. Once a line is transmitting power, switching it off to install the

devices over long distances is an unfavourable option for any power utility. High rates of collisions can be prevented if new power lines are erected away from known hotspots for bird activity, like wetlands that attract cranes, flamingos and other waterfowl. Wherever diverting the power lines is not feasible, bird flight diverters should be attached in high-risk zones.

Once again, bustards pose a greater challenge than other species –they do not seem to follow any major flight paths, instead roaming widely in response to patchy flushes of insect food. Therefore, birdwise environmental practitioners are recommending that new power lines should be routed close to roads or staggered alongside existing power lines (see text box). These interventions aim to make the power lines more obvious to bustards from a longer distance, giving them a better chance to increase altitude and thus avoid a collision.

Of course the best long-term solution, but probably the least palatable, is to reduce the need for more power lines! This is where you, the public, can help – by reducing consumption and switching to local onyour-roof generation using solar or wind power. Sunny southern Africa with all its solar potential should have solar water heaters on every roof. This could reduce domestic electricity consumption by a third, and remove the necessity for bigger and longer transmission lines that are being planned to bring power from giant electricity generation projects such as Grand Inga Dam on the Congo River. Just think of all the birds that will pay the price for our insatiable need for electricity. It’s criminal.

Bird collisions with power lines are a major unsolved problem worldwide. We need to devote more attention to the issue: more systematic studies in collaboration with engineers are required to generate out-of-the-box ideas and practical solutions. The various initiatives by Eskom in South Africa, NamPower in Namibia and other utilities are moving in the right direction, but there is still a long way to go.

How staggering power lines might reduce bustard mortality in Namibia

A new 400 kV power line is being planned between Windhoek and Keetmanshoop, to increase the capacity and stability of Namibia’s electricity network. The endpoints are already connected with two power lines, one 220 kV and one 400 kV, both of which traverse prime bustard habitat and cause substantial bustard mortalities.

To mitigate these mortalities, we suggested a novel approach – to place the new line as close as possible to the established 400 kV line, and stagger the towers so that each tower is close to the middle of the span between towers on the adjacent line. This suggestion is based on extensive fieldwork in Namibia and South Africa showing that about 90% of bustard collisions with power lines occur towards the middle of the lines. It seems that bustards are better able to see or hear the towers than the lines between the towers. Consequently, if the new line is built close to the existing line with its towers optimally staggered, then bustard collisions would be reduced. Theoretically, collisions could be 67% lower than if the new line is built far from the existing one. In an article published in the Namibian Journal of Environment we call for a scientific study to assess bustard mortality along staggered power lines, and to compare this to mortality along single or non-staggered parallel lines in similar habitat.

Reference: Pallett, J., Simmons, R.E., and Brown, C.J. (2022). Staggered towers on parallel transmission lines: A new mitigation measure to reduce collisions of birds, especially bustards. Namibian Journal of Environment 6(A): 14-21.

John Pallett thanks NCE, NamPower, NNF and the FitzPatrick Institute for African Ornithology for logistical and financial support to this project.

CITIZEN SCIENCE IN NAMIBIA

By Alice Jarvis

If you ever played i-spy, citizen science is for you. From the arid desert with a few hardy plants and animals, to the rivers in the lush Zambezi Region where over 400 species of birds fly above tall trees, to wetlands, fisheries and elephants – Namibia boasts extraordinary biodiversity. Now you can record some of that biodiversity using your smartphone and thus contribute to Namibian science and conservation.

In Namibia we often take our habitat and ecology for granted, but worldwide, agriculture and urban development is reducing habitat and biodiversity at an alarming rate. The exciting news is that anyone can contribute to our understanding of our environment. As citizens, or as visitors to Namibia, we have an opportunity to join the scientists mapping our flora and fauna, by creating an atlas of the natural world around us. Knowledge is power. The more we know about our habitats and what lives in them, the better we can conserve them, for ourselves and our children.

A popular definition of citizen science is “the collection and analysis of data relating to the natural world by members of the general public, typically as part of a collaborative project with professional scientists”. Data sets collected through public participation are a valuable way to learn more about the distribution of species. Previous examples of citizen science projects in Namibia include the Southern African Bird Atlas Project, the Tree Atlas Project, bird ringing, raptor road counts, and the giraffe spotter initiative.

Atlasing in Namibia is the most extensive Namibian citizen science project to date, inviting records of mammals, snakes and other reptiles, frogs and toads, butterflies, breeding birds and plants – both indigenous and alien. You can submit data from live sightings, road kills, photographs, camera traps, telemetry, spoor and any other form of record. There is also a section to record archaeological and cultural heritage sites such as rock art, ancient middens and graves. This platform is part of the larger Environmental Information System (EIS) of Namibia, which is a massive repository of information in many formats.

Besides recording new sightings, the atlas provides an important data repository for historical information and data collected for specific purposes, such as research projects. By bringing Namibia’s biodiversity data together, we can enhance their value and usefulness. Comparisons become possible across space and time, as well as between and across species. For example, the atlas data were recently used for the new Carnivore Red Data Book and a biological control programme for alien plants.

Who can participate? Everyone! If you have an interest in Namibia’s plants, animals and archaeology or history, you can contribute information on what you see. As more people get involved, the value

of the information increases. The easiest way to participate is to download and use the Atlasing in Namibia mobile application. The app allows you to record your sightings while you are out and about. It is easy to use and works on both Android and iOS devices.

You don’t need an active Internet connection to use the app, but you do need to have your device’s GPS switched on. Date, time and location are automatically recorded. Use the “Sync” button to submit your records when you are back online. If you can’t identify with certainty what you are seeing, you can still record it and mark the identification as uncertain to alert a specialist to check it for you. There are also photo guides for some species groups on the app and website to help you identify your records. All app records are imported into the EIS website, thus becoming part of our national database.

You can also submit records directly onto the website. It allows you to view, enter and to edit your records and is the method to use if you are entering records from the past or a different location. The website keeps a tally of how many records you have submitted and how many species you have recorded and part of the fun – for many people – is to see how they compare with their friends and colleagues.

The atlas continues to expand, and two new sections have just been launched. One of these allows you to record indigenous plants, of which there are close to 4,000 species in Namibia. The other is the Power line section (available on the app only) to record bird casualties associated with power line infrastructure. For the power line component you can survey the area under a power line on foot, in a vehicle or by bike and record all evidence of bird incidents such as collisions or electrocutions (carcasses, feathers etc.) that you find on the way. Finish the survey by entering the type of power line structure and the distance you covered. Alternatively, if you happen to pass under a power line and find a carcass you can also record this as an incident, without doing a full survey. This information is invaluable for guiding the construction of new power line infrastructure and to identify existing structures that cause high mortalities and could be altered to reduce their impact on birds.

Whether you are an avid naturalist, tour guide, farmer, visitor to Namibia or simply someone who loves to be outdoors, now you can play i-spy and upload what you see, helping science and conservation in Namibia.

How to download the Atlasing in Namibia app

You can download the app from Google Play Store – just search for Atlasing in Namibia To find other details and links on the Atlasing in Namibia website: the-eis.com/ atlas

NCE Supports

For a comprehensive view of the Namibian Chamber of Environment’s (NCE) work, see pg. 6-7. Here, we highlight the Namibian Journal of Environment.

NAMIBIAN JOURNAL OF ENVIRONMENT

The Namibian Journal of Environment (NJE) is an online scientific journal that is now in its sixth year of publication. It has been supported by NCE since its inception and creates a platform for interested parties from all walks of life to submit contributions to be considered for publication. Three editors have volunteered their time and expertise to maintain the journal’s high standard –Barbara Curtis (2017 and 2018), Dr John Irish (2019 to early 2021) and Dr Ken Stratford (late 2021 to current).

NJE creates an accessible, free platform for scientists, planners, developers, managers and everyone involved in promoting Namibia’s sustainable development. It accepts and publishes contributions from students and highly experienced scientists alike. A team of editors coordinated through the Ongava Research Centre handles day-to-day editorial matters, and an editorial committee lends support where needed.

In its first five years, NJE published 46 articles on a wide range of topics: reports of new plant species, beetle checklists, soil and vegetation surveys, predator behaviour and diet studies, human-snake conflict, and technical monographs on bird moulting patterns, among others. Volume 6 continues this broad and varied trend with research articles on seabirds, lions, trophy hunting, media coverage of climate change, and more.

All the articles published by NJE have one thing in common: they relate in some way to Namibia and the majority report on work carried out here. However, their impact is broader than this and several articles have been picked up by international media and formed the basis of newspaper articles and scientific features around the world. Dr Philip Stander’s paper on lions at the Skeleton Coast feeding on cormorants and seals is a prime example, featuring in articles in the UK’s The Guardian newspaper and on French TV.

NJE covers the broad environmental areas of ecology, agriculture, forestry, agroforestry, social science, economics, water and energy, climate change, planning, land use, pollution, strategic and environmental assessments and related fields, as they pertain to Namibia. The journal addresses Namibia’s sustainable development agenda in its broadest context. It publishes four categories of articles:

• Section A: Research articles. High quality peer-reviewed papers in basic and applied research, conforming to accepted scientific paper format and standards, and based on primary research findings, including testing of hypotheses and taxonomic revisions.

• Section B: Research reports. High quality peer-reviewed papers, generally shorter or less formal than Section A, including short notes, field observations, syntheses and reviews, scientific documentation and checklists.

• Section C: Open articles. Contributions not based on formal research results but nevertheless pertinent to Namibian environmental science, including opinion pieces, discussion papers, meta-data publications, book reviews, correspondence, corrections and similar.

• Section D: Monographs and memoirs. Peer-reviewed monographic contributions and comprehensive subject treatments (> 100 pages), including collections of related shorter papers like conference proceedings.

There is no charge for publishing in NJE and all published articles are available to download for free from the journal’s website www.nje.org.na

THE ROLE OF NCE IN DEVELOPMENT PROJECTS

Each year, well over 1,000 projects require an Environmental Clearance Certificate (ECC) under Namibia’s Environmental Management Act of 2007 before they may be implemented. This process is administered by the Office of the Environmental Commissioner within the Ministry of Environment, Forestry and Tourism. Each project requiring an ECC must have an environmental impact assessment (EIA) and an environmental management plan (EMP).

Proponents of projects typically appoint an environmental practitioner or a company specialising in environmental and social assessments to carry our this work on their behalf. These practitioners and companies are independent of the proponent. Their “client” is the long-term welfare of Namibia’s environment and people. Their job is to assess whether the proposed project is good for Namibia’s long-term sustainable development agenda or not, and whether negative aspects could be mitigated and positive aspects enhanced.

Appropriate public consultation forms an important part of each EIA. The NCE assists people to keep track of the dozens of EIA notices in the media each week by compiling and sending them by e-mail to relevant people and organisations. For example, prospecting and mining activities are relevant to farmers and their associations, conservancies, local communities, national parks, biodiversity specialists, groundwater specialists, among others. It is impossible for NCE to track all the EIAs being carried out in Namibia. We focus on those projects which are potentially high risk.

There are some major challenges faced by the EIA process, as revealed by a few recent high-profile projects. First, far too many activities are listed that require ECCs. The Office of the Environmental Commissioner simply cannot cope with the volume of EIAs being submitted. This results in potentially high impact projects not getting adequate attention. It also results in long delays on lower impact projects, thereby slowing down development and making Namibia a less attractive place for both local and foreign investment.

Second, there is no regulatory professional body for environmental practitioners, unlike many other professions. A group of environmental practitioners drafted legislation to assist government more than six years ago, but there has been little response from the Office of the Environmental Commissioner. In the interim, some practitioners have established the Environmental Assessment Professionals Association of Namibia (EAPAN) to set standards, qualifications, experience, code of conduct and a mentoring programme for young Namibians entering the profession. Due to the lack of relevant legislation, anyone can set themselves up as an EIA practitioner, and they need not join EAPAN. As a result, many EIAs and processes are of poor quality and open to being challenged, on both technical and legal grounds.

There is a general expectation that, with the name “environment” in the title of the NCE, we will oppose all development projects. This is

not true. We look very carefully at each project on its merit, track the EIA work and the findings of the specialists, and any external reviews which might have taken place.

The NCE focuses on environmental science, which must be distinguished from the term “environmentalist”. What is an “environmentalist”? There is no qualification for this title, and it seems to range from any member of the public who is interested in nature through to experts in the environmental field such as ecologists and conservation biologists. While it is good and important that the general public are interested in and protective of our environment, they are not experts in the field of environmental science.

Our stance on any given project is therefore based on environmental science and the need for sustainable development. Based on these principles, we support projects that have low environmental impact and high potential to create jobs and boost the economy. The marine phosphate project is one such example: 27 specialist studies and two independent reviews predict low environmental impacts and high economic outputs from this project.

Using these same principles, we do not support other projects that pose significant environmental, human health and economic threats to Namibia. An example is the proposed in-situ leach uranium mining proposed for the Kalahari basin in eastern Namibia. This type of mining could cause uranium leakage into the groundwater, thus poisoning the water for both humans and livestock in a huge area. Another example is the Recon Africa oil and gas exploration in the Kavango regions. In our view, there should simply be no fracking allowed on land. Both of these environmentally destructive projects should be closed down now.

The two damaging projects above have adapted a “salami slice” approach to their EIA work, revealing just what the next step in the process entails, and carefully avoiding – indeed closing – any discussion on what the final development would look like in terms of impacts. To address this loophole in our procedures, (a) project proponents through their environmental practitioners need to clearly spell out what the intended final development would look like and specify the likely impacts, and (b) government needs to establish threshold criteria for some highly damaging projects such as fracking and in-situ leach mining, beyond which projects will be automatically rejected.

NCE’s role is to apply environmental science (not “environmentalism”) to assess the costs and benefits to Namibia for each project, oppose bad projects and support good projects. We share this information so that the thinking public can understand the rationale and feel comfortable that Namibia is adopting a sensible approach to its development for a sustainable future.

Le Roux van Schalkwyk

Promoting and supporting conservation of the natural environment.

A membership-based organisation established as a voluntary association to support and promote the interests of environmental NGOs and their work to protect Namibia’s environment, biodiversity and landscapes. The NCE currently has 70 members and associate members, comprising environmental NGOs and individuals running nationally significant environmental projects and programmes.

www.n-c-e.org

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