Let’s skip past the universal acknowledgement that the natural world is brilliant and cut straight to the ugly truth of conservation. The truth is, to protect both wildlife and their natural environment, animals ultimately need to have a dollar value assigned to them. To give you a crude example, let’s say each lion is worth $100, and each leopard is worth $20. Only then, with their prices affixed and a natural area’s value able to be calculated, will animals survive in our largely capitalistic society. To discuss this properly, we will put aside all the emotional and spiritual arguments, which we should point out, are all valid and ideals we strongly believe in. We 100% agree that animals have the right to thrive and that the concept doesn't just extend to the cute ones. We also agree that these animals and natural spaces should be protected for their own sake, not just to make money.
But this is the real world. Typically, it’s only when an environment is worth more in its natural state, than any other use for it, that it is then protected. In other words, to be protected, the natural area needs to be worth more intact than the sum of its parts. In a competition between opposing forces, whatever side makes the most money is often the one that wins. Just ask the rhinoceros and its nutritionally useless but insanely valuable horn.
Historically, as humans spread across the world unchecked, we displace all before us. This can be the natural world, the animals that lived there and even the people who were there before us. We slowly but surely covered the earth, from north to south, and shaped it to our will. Our effect on the natural world was dramatic, but it wasn’t until the explosion of mechanisation and industrialisation that our insatiable demand began to run ahead of supply. The world we lived in was no longer endless. Even back in the 1800’s, there was a thought that the world was running out of wild spaces. As a result of this Yellowstone National Park, the first national park in the world, came into existence in 1872. In Africa, Kruger National Park was created in 1926. Bit by bit, piece by piece, these limited spaces were set aside as reserved space for the natural environment, whilst we also simultaneously dominated the land outside them. But these parks, with their restrictive and unnatural borders, remained an open-air zoo, with animals largely living natural lives within them but forever restricted by the boundaries of the park. If they dared to wander outside of these borders, they faced death.
It’s all good and well to say that people shouldn’t kill elephants. But when that elephant is stripping the crops you desperately need to feed your family and also threatening your life at the same time, and you also get no financial benefit from the elephant continuing to live, that the situation becomes more complex. For the longest time the neighbours of these national parks, the ones who had to deal with lions killing their cattle and elephants trampling their crops, couldn’t even afford to visit the parks themselves. A lion is a very different animal depending on how you view it, whether as a camera-toting tourist in a game vehicle or as a mother just walking her kids to a school.
Outside of these national parks and reserves, the animals had some other places they could live, but these were historically no better. Typically, the only other land set aside for wild animals were vast hunting concessions. These often adjoined the national parks themselves, effectively acting as a buffer between the locals and the animals, but at the cost of the animal's lives. Whilst as a plus this meant that this vast area of land remained undeveloped and protected, in reality, it was protected only as you would protect any other asset. For these animals to have this space to live, they were first assigned a value, their lives sold off for visitors to take.
National Parks and national reserves spread across the world during the 20th century as our realisation that we needed to protect these spaces grew. But, in reality, a national park without funding is just a space awaiting formal development. Like an empty lot, it is neither developed nor conserved. Despite national parks existing across Africa, with the funding needed to run them going elsewhere in these newly independent countries, these ‘parks’ remained unprotected. As the saying goes, “Conservation without money is just conversation”.
It wasn’t until the mid to late 20th century that the conversation began to change around the type of shots that the visiting tourists were to take. In an age where international travel has become more common, an animal shot once with a rifle earns the owner a payment once, but an animal shot multiple times with a camera earns money each time. And so, for as much financial as ethical reasons, photographic safaris began to take over areas of land that were formerly farms and hunting concessions. It was the birth of the modern safari.
Visitors to Africa fall in love with its wildlife. But, as much as the focus tourists bring to the animals and the wildlife brings awareness, awareness doesn’t pay the bills. It is the money they bring that does the heavy lifting. As the old joke in so-called ‘voluntourism’ goes, it’s wonderful that well-meaning 20-year-olds can dig a few holes and hammer a few nails, but they’d rather just have your money and do it right instead.
And the money is talking. Governments and private enterprise across the world are noticing the money that tourism brings, and realising that they better protect the reason why tourists come. And so, almost as a by-product instead of a focus, the booming safari industry has brought in the rise of modern conservation. Instead of waiting for governments to save the land as some sort of formal designation, and also then continue to fund it, conservation has turned to private enterprise instead to help lock the land off for the natural world. And more and more so, bringing the local communities into the conversation and conservation. You can see this in action across Africa, from Botswana’s Delta to Zimbabwe’s Hwange. In some places, like the oft overcrowded Masai Mara in Kenya for example, these private concessions have allowed the animals additional space to live away from the crowds. In fact, the combined size of these conservancies is almost the same as the Mara itself, all leased from 14,500 Maasai landholders. And even more so, conservancies are allowing separate wild areas to be now connected to each other, creating more natural migratory options for the animals to live in.
We were recently in Tswalu, the largest private game reserve in South Africa, tucked up in the northern borders of the country. Let’s be clear: Tswalu is not a budget lodge. It is extremely luxurious, with extremely high-end experiences and all the touches that a lodge of this sort brings. But rather than just being a fee-for-service like a grand hotel in Dubai, this money you pay here is all in service of something bigger. It all started as a decimated region of overgrazed farmland in an arid area. But, as time and conservation efforts have continued, the land has re-established itself. The contrasting images of the landscape alone are startling. And with that change, the native animals, with the land now able to be lived on, came flooding back. In addition to the ‘headline’ animals, you can now find endangered animals like roan and sable in great abundance, as well as pangolins. Cheetahs are also a critically endangered species, and now Tswalu has the enviable problem of trying to limit too many outside cheetahs from coming in. Bit by bit, piece by piece, this reserve has been expanding and growing parcel by parcel, and now sits at over 114,000 hectares (about 282,000 acres) of restored and protected wild areas. But, unlike the growth seen in the previous century, this growth doesn’t exclude the locals from the benefits. In addition to training and potential future employment in both tourism and complementary industries, it also benefits the communities through funding and services. For example, Tswalu’s clinic provides free primary health care to anyone living within a 100-kilometre radius of the reserve. For a local, protecting a lion is great, but that lion bringing tourists in that then allows your family to get health care in a remote area is the real win.
This influx of private capital hasn’t just changed these former farms and hunting concessions. In other cases, this has saved the national parks themselves. African Parks was founded in 2000 due to the decline in landscape protection in national parks, caused by lack of funding and poor management. They are now responsible for the management of 22 protected areas in 12 countries, covering over 20 million hectares of land. This includes national parks like Akagera and Nyungwi in Rwanda, Kafue and Liuwa Plains in Zambia, Matusadona in Zimbabwe, Liwonde in Malawi and Odzala-Kokoua in the Republic of Congo. This means they, a non-governmental non-profit conservation organisation, are responsible for the protection, growth and development of these national assets. The results seem to speak for themselves. Funded by private donations, carbon sequestering credits and park income (often if any at the beginning), these parks as a whole have seen a 50% increase in wildlife numbers and a 70% reduction in poaching. In addition, over 2.5 million people are now benefitting from both the ecosystems they live alongside and the socio-economic opportunities that they bring.
As a side note, to combat the visitation issue mentioned earlier, over 10,000 local students now go on excursions to visit these parks for environmental education each year, an idea first originating in the private concessions years ago.
When Covid lockdowns happened and visitors weren’t able to visit, it quickly became evident how much the continued existence of the animals relied on travellers coming to spend time and money in the wild. Without money coming in, families still have to be fed. And so, at great financial cost to themselves, lodges and safari operators stepped up and paid these costs themselves. This money went to the communities, not to direct animal intervention. It seems tasteless to be talking so much about money when we are talking about conservation. But, without an honest discussion about the reality of it, the best intentions are just empty platitudes. And it remains that one of the best ways you can contribute to environmental and wildlife conservation is to pay to visit the regions yourselves. This money then enables the locals to make a living from their land, and the land remains protected. That truly is a win-win, for everyone.
Side note: This is why we enjoy what we do. It is our job, and it is a business. But, by creating trips for travellers, we make their long-held dreams come true. And in doing that, we then also help to protect the parts of the world we adore. So, whilst it can be a difficult job, it definitely isn’t a chore.
