Zimbabwe in poaching crisis

Date: 11 September 2000

Source: BBC

Author: Grant Ferrett

Officials at Africa's largest privately owned game park, the Save Valley Conservancy in Zimbabwe, say poachers have killed more than 1,600 animals in the reserve since government supporters began their campaign of invasions of white-owned land earlier this year.

The Tourism Minister, Francis Nhema, who visited the area at the weekend, condemned those responsible, saying the culture of environmental destruction should stop.

Save Valley Conservancy was one of Zimbabwe's great environmental success stories.

Previously a collection of more than 20 separate cattle ranches, it was transformed into Africa's biggest privately owned wildlife reserve in the early 1990s after a disastrous drought made farming impossible.

Hundreds of elephants were brought in and the near extinct black rhino was breeding more successfully there than anywhere in the world.

All that changed in February this year when government supporters, led by the War Veteran's Association, began illegally occupying white-owned land including parts of Save.

Since then large parts of the perimeter fence have been cut down and used to create crude wire snares.

Elephants, rhinos, antelopes, zebras and giraffes have all been trapped.

The police have largely refused to become involved, describing the matter as political.

During a visit to see the damage for himself, the Tourism Minister said it pained him to see such destruction, adding that it would be folly to resettle people on land unsuited to farming.

The authorities say police are stepping up patrols in the area to combat poaching.

Similar previous commitments have remained unfulfilled.

If the authorities don't act quickly the very existence of the Save project is threatened.