Being a ranger is no walk in the park. Just ask Tina Lain - the leader of over 200 rangers working in the remote and dangerous Upemba National Park in the Democratic Republic of Congo. Since 2017, Forgotten Parks Foundation (FPF) has rehabilitated Upemba from years of rebel groups, poachers and illegal mining.
French conservation organization Noé, which assumed management of Conkouati in 2021, is seeing increasing signs that wildlife is beginning to feel less threatened, and this encounter with an extremely relaxed bull was a highlight of Dr. Chris Thouless’ recent visit to this ECF supported project.
The picturesque landscapes of Luangwa Valley, located in Eastern Zambia, are teeming with biodiversity, including a large population of elephants. South Luangwa covers approximately 14,000km² and is also home to South Luangwa National Park. Here, coexistence of elephants and human communities has become increasingly strained due to rising human-elephant conflict (HEC) incidents. The surge in … Continued
Nigeria has gained a reputation as one of Africa’s main wildlife trafficking hubs, with criminals taking advantage of high levels of corruption and poor law enforcement. Lagos is one of Africa’s primary exit points for large shipments of elephant ivory, pangolin scales, and other illegal wildlife products. These flow from West, Central and Southern Africa, are consolidated in Nigeria, and shipped on to Vietnam and elsewhere in Asia.
In August 2022, African Parks signed a 10-year renewable agreement with the Government of the Republic of South Sudan, for the management of Boma and Badingilo National Parks. The vast, wild Boma-Badingilo landscape, almost twice the size of Tsavo National Park in Kenya, lies east of the Nile River, extending to the Ethiopian border. The area is best known for its massive migration of white-eared kob and tiang antelope, the second-largest terrestrial mammal migration in the world after the Serengeti wildebeest.
Thanks to the efforts of many, the reduction in the ivory crisis over the last five years has been a significant, but still fragile, success. Ten years ago, it would have been difficult to imagine the world as it is today— one in which most of the major ivory trafficking networks have been so severely disrupted that traffickers are unwilling to take the risk of dealing in ivory, and where Chinese law enforcement agencies are carrying out their own sophisticated investigations into trafficking networks and diligently following up on leads provided to them by international NGOs. These changes are tremendously positive for elephants.
Across Africa, we are losing small elephant populations at a distressing rate. In many places, particularly in West Africa, there are tiny populations of ‘ghost elephants’ often consisting of fewer than five individuals, too few to have a chance of long-term survival. They are often refugees in their own homelands, moving in secret between small patches of habitat.