The 200 elephants will be hunted in areas of conflict with human populations in Hwange Nature Reserve, the largest in the country, said ZimParks managing director Fulton Mangwanya.
ZimParks says there are 65,000 in Hwange alone, four times more than the park is able to accommodate. Namibia announced in early September that it had begun culling more than 700 wild animals, including 83 elephants, to, the government says, feed the drought-stricken population while easing pressure on mined grasslands and water resources due to drought.
Zimbabwe and Namibia are among the southern African countries that have declared states of emergency due to the drought. “The government should find more sustainable and greener methods to deal with the drought,” said Farai Maguwu, director of the Center for Natural Resource Management, an NGO.
“Vulnerable” species.
“We have to stop this because it is unethical,” he added. Chris Brown, an environmental activist and head of the Namibian Environment Chamber, points out, however, that “elephants have a devastating effect on the natural habitat if they are allowed to multiply exponentially”.
“They damage the ecosystem and natural habitats […] other less emblematic species and which therefore matter less in the eyes of armchair environmentalists, sitting in the city”, he denounces, “these species matter as much as elephants”, in a context where the habitats and resources of water are stressed by drought.