MALVERN KARIDOZO: Project Update: September 2007

Darted collared elephant

Major findings from this study to date:

The main threat to wildlife species is habitat loss and fragmentation leaving wildlife to survive in ‘refuges’ linked by areas under high conservation threat.

Identification and prioritizing of at least five wildlife refuges linked with several corridors that run through densely settled land.

Results of tracking the current preferred migration of elephants between three of the refuges using radio collars have been combined with a GIS analysis to examine the zone where conservation of habitat would have least impact on current activities within the communal and peri-urban lands.

At least four suitable corridors were identified using least-cost analysis allowing for the improved conservation of the wildlife therefore potentially increasing the benefits to local residents by both reducing human/wildlife conflict and increasing income from tourism.

There is persistent and growing pressure for land by subsistence and commercial farmers and tour operators in the identified corridors.

Rapidly expanding human populations maintained by a booming tourism sector are changing land use patterns in a way that results in a contraction of habitat available to wildlife.