Exploring rangers' preferences for community‐based strategies to improve human‐elephant coexistence in African natural corridors

Abstract

Natural corridors are essential components of wildlife conservation but, when human-wildlife conflicts emerge, the participation of local communities becomes imperative to ensure their efficacy and long-term persistence. Therefore, local people initiatives and commitments (community-based strategies) promoting humanwildlife coexistence are urgently needed especially in African natural corridors dominated by elephants (Loxodonta africana). Wildlife rangers represent skilled technical staff who are involved in the monitoring and protection of wildlife but also in promoting human-wildlife coexistence and community awareness. They are the closest conservation staff to local communities and have broad experience in dealing with elephants around the villages. Therefore, collecting and recognizing the knowledge of wildlife rangers on the suitability of possible local solutions could contribute to the successful planning and implementation of human elephant mitigation measures at farmer level. This study aims to quantify wildlife rangers' preferences for community-based strategies to increase human-elephant coexistence in the Selous-Niassa Wildlife Corridor (Southern Tanzania). In particular, we evaluated wildlife rangers' preferences regarding three attributes: local farm-based mitigation measures, the implication of technical support in the implementation of those measures and the preferred level of cooperation in the local community for that implementation. In 2019, we conducted a discrete choice experiment by interviewing 63 wildlife rangers (41% of the total rangers working along the corridor). Results showed that the most preferred management strategy included building chili-oil fences by farmers cooperating at community level and technically supported by external institutions. Other strategies considered were (in decreasing order of importance) crop species selection, beehive fences, crop translocation, cooperation in small groups, and the use of noisemakers. The discrete choice analysis of wildlife rangers' preferences, including the type and level of cooperation, allows quantifying the suitability of different management strategies for mitigating human-wildlife coexistence challenges.

Protected Area Rangers as Cultural Brokers? Implications for Wildlife Crime Prevention in Viet Nam

“…This paper also contributes to the knowledge base on rangerbased monitoring of natural resources and wildlife crime. Rangers have access to unique information about both wildlife and the communities in which they are embedded, and thus have an important perspective on which community-based interventions may or may not prevent wildlife crime (Montero-Botey et al, 2021). This ranger-generated information is distinct from, and complementary to, the knowledge gained through scientific models of poaching (Kuiper et al, 2020).…”

“…This includes work on interactions between junior rangers and their supervisors (Moreto et al, 2021b), what motivates rangers to engage with conservation monitoring (Kuiper et al, 2021), rangers' sense of self-legitimacy (Moreto et al, 2021a), how rangers collaborate with scientists to improve monitoring of threatened species (Kuiper et al, 2020), and how to increase ranger capacity through competency, critical mass, and strong support systems . Studies have also specifically examined rangers' attitudes toward communitybased conservation and outreach, as rangers often have detailed knowledge about the suitability of different community-based interventions to achieve conservation objectives (Montero-Botey et al, 2021). Rangers who support complements to traditional enforcement, such as community meetings, mention that these interventions are beneficial not just because of citizen education, but because they advance lines of communication between different stakeholders (Moreto and Charlton, 2021).…”

Let Us Give Voice to Local Farmers: Preferences for Farm-Based Strategies to Enhance Human–Elephant Coexistence in Africa

“…Additionally, Tanzania is an example where the government and local communities are willing to engage in mitigating these types of challenges. This is proved by the “National Human-Wildlife Conflict Management Strategy 2020–2024” [ 54 ] and the fact that rangers commonly work on chasing away elephants from farms and are also involved in citizen science [ 24 ]. In addition, some farmers are already applying some farm-based mitigation measures, such as chili fences, encouraged and supported in the corridor by PAMS (Protected Areas Management Solution) Foundation and WWF (World Wild Fund for Nature).…”

“…They are: (1) specific farm-based measures that farmers can apply to reduce elephant damage to humans and human means, which include six different scientifically proven effective strategies: (a) chili-oil fences [ 58 , 59 , 60 ]; (b) noisemakers [ 61 , 62 ]; (c) beehive fences [ 63 ]; (d) surveillance [ 61 , 64 ]; (e) crop selection [ 34 , 65 , 66 , 67 ]; and (f) crop relocation [ 68 ]; (2) the level of cooperation in the implementation of different tools, which has been defined as an important key for the success of mitigation measures [ 16 ], defined in a qualitative manner: (a) individual, (b) small groups of neighbors (2–3 households, as represented in Figure 2 ), and (c) large groups (>10 households, as illustrated in Figure 2 ) and community levels) [ 69 , 70 ]; (3) the involvement of technical support given by NGOs or the government in the process [ 71 ] considering (a) yes, it is present, and (b) no, it is not, which provides important information about how much farmers trust those institutions; and (4) a monetary attribute to estimate the willingness to pay per household and commonly used to quantify preferences. In this case, we also considered the monetary cost that farmers should assume when implementing the elephant crop damage mitigation program, which was not considered in the rangers’ study performed by Montero-Botey et al [ 24 ]. The monetary attribute had four levels from 10,000 TZS (~5$) to 40,000 TZS (~20$) and represented the monetary cost per year for a farmer to apply the measure selected in one acre.…”

“…To avoid false expectations being raised in the local communities, all proposed strategies are supported by science, relatively inexpensive, and applicable by the farmers on their own. In addition, wildlife rangers were informed about these strategies and their preferences were previously analyzed [ 24 ], which will allow us to shed some light on the potential conflicts between rangers and farmers when choosing, planning, and implementing the proposed mitigation measures. Conflicts between rangers and farmers regarding the implementation of mitigation measures influence the success of the measures as wildlife rangers hold a key role in the community awareness and protection of people’s livelihoods from wildlife [ 25 , 26 ].…”