Featured result

Wildlife conservation

  

 

On the topic of forest ecosystems, the research work has used a bio-economic model to analyse wildlife conservation in two habitats adjacent to a national park by two types of communities in Zimbabwe.

One community is made up of peasant farmers operating under a benefit-sharing scheme, while the other is made up of commercial farmers practising game farming in a conservancy.

Both communities exploit wildlife by selling hunting licenses to foreign hunters but with different levels of success. The park agency plays a central role in authorising the harvest quota for each community.

A bio-economic model has been formulated for the three agents, optimising the market problem for each agent and comparing the outcomes with the social planner's solution.

The results show that the level of anti-poaching enforcement by the park agency is suboptimal, while anti-poaching effort exerted by the conservancy community achieves social optimality.

Finally, institutional reforms in benefit-sharing schemes could result in the decisions of the communities gravitating towards the social optimum.

 

Read further

Ntuli, Herbert, Edwin Muchapondwa (2017). "A bioeconomic analysis of community wildlife conservation in Zimbabwe." Journal for Nature Conservation 37: 106-121.