Pandemic of Poaching

By Kate Thompson, Safina Center Launchpad Fellow

Photo: Kate Thompson

I’ve turned off my google flight alerts for Tanzania. I was planning to return in the fall, but like many field scientists, I’ve been grounded. My lab mates’ dissertation research has been canceled—whole projects shelved—until we can better manage the risks of spreading COVID-19 to the communities and ecosystems our work strives to protect.

As I accept my own change of itinerary, it’s made me think about how many would-be-tourists are likewise canceling their holiday safaris and what this will mean for National Parks in East Africa. In Tanzania, news has been scant due to government suppression of journalism related to the pandemic. As of May, the country expects a ~75% reduction in tourism. Although the government has lifted formal travel bans, it is unlikely that tourists will flock to a country that hasn’t provided reports on active cases or deaths since mid-April. This will no doubt present a huge loss to the hundreds of thousands of Tanzanians employed directly by the ecotourism industry, and the larger numbers who benefit indirectly from the income tourism brings into their communities. I worry that, at a time when international aid is more constrained than ever, our region is poised on the precipice of a duel financial and public health crisis.

And then there’s the poaching. As national parks and other protective areas see donations, federal contributions, and tourist revenue plummet, wildlife become increasingly vulnerable to illegal hunting. Anti-poaching personnel, often separate from the main staff of a park, have been laid off indefinitely in numerous places across continental Africa. There are indirect consequences too. The loss of the presence of tourist cars in parks alone may embolden people who would normally be deterred by the bustle of people moving through protected areas. Kenya has already reported increased occurrences of subsistence level bushmeat hunting and ivory poaching and these trends likely hold in neighboring, albeit data deficient, protected areas. With rising pressure to provide for their families by any means possible and opportunities within the ecotourism sector vanishing, people are understandably desperate. Human food security and poverty is inextricably linked to wildlife hunting. Lockdowns have decreased food availability and livelihood alternatives for already vulnerable communities.

These rising pressures, mounting from seemingly every side, present no simple solution. They are a stark reminder of how public health affects conservation, and given the zoonotic origins of this disease, vice versa. It is a call for renewed efforts to support alternative livelihoods that provide cushions during times of crises. It is an incitement to better support research into preventing spillover events in the first place, through a combination of bushmeat hunting research, virus surveillance, and community education. I believe this reckoning hasn’t come too late but that it has come with consequences we in the East African research community are just beginning to see unfold.