[klaasvakie]

It's about time Botswana did something about their elephant numbers. Chobe is practically overrun with elephants, and until now, the government seemed unwilling to keep the numbers under control.

If they can raise money for conservation by combining their culling activities with trophy hunting I think it is a win for everybody. This can turn a pure cost-centre into a revenue generating activity with the income applied to other desperately underfunded efforts like Rhino conservation.

I support hunting for food, but don't support trophy hunting unless it is part of a culling program or part of removing problem animals.

[undersuit]

I question whether Botswana needs to kill their elephants, especially as reports have Botswana containing 1/3 of the entire African Elephant population.

>Chobe is practically overrun with elephants

And the proposed law will not fix that, hunting would only be allowed outside preservation areas.

I like the final line of the article:

>Mr Guma therefore said government should swiftly act on how best to resolve the human/wildlife conflict and that the lift on the hunting ban and shooting of elephants in areas not designated as game reserves could be remedial to the crisis.

[klaasvakie]

> I question whether Botswana needs to kill their elephants, especially as reports have Botswana containing 1/3 of the entire African Elephant population.

Obviously killing elephants (any animal really) in large numbers is a big problem on many levels. Transporting elephants is also difficult and expensive, and more importantly you need someplace to put them. Most of the other big game reserves in Southern Africa also have problems keeping their elephant numbers in check. Where would you take them?

> And the proposed law will not fix that, hunting would only be allowed outside preservation areas.

I haven't been up there in a couple of years, but the fencing around Chobe is spotty at best, the entire riverfront is unfenced (at least the part you get to see as a visitor), so I don't think there is really a big restriction on the Elephants' freedom of movement. I am guessing this is one of the reasons why they can cause so much damage to the crops of local farmers, they aren't really fenced inside the game reserve properly.

Targeting the elephants outside the park does more to alleviate the farmers' immediate problem, but its the same population of elephants (in the broad sense, not the herd sense) inside and outside the park.