Zambezia (1990), XVII (ii).RESEARCH REPORTCONSERVATION IN ZIMBABWEAS SEEN BY EUROPEANS*R. K. RYLATTTHE IDEA FOR this article was formulated at the time of the CITES (Conventionon International Trade in Endangered Species) conference in Lausannewhich (amongst other things) was discussing a ban on the sale of ivoryand rhino horn. It investigates the perceptions, opinions and views ofEuropeans on these issues and what the European press actually reported,which may not be quite what was actually said, but is what people readand presumably believe.At that time (October 1989) there were a number of emotive articles inthe western European press on the subject and as Zimbabwe was one ofthe countries arguing against a ban on the sale of ivory it figured promi-nently in a not particularly favourable way. One article headed 'One family'sholiday in the killing fields of Zimbabwe'1 told the story of a family's week-long hunting trip to Dande which included the killing of an elephant, aleopard, a bushbuck, a waterbuck, an impala, a warthog and two buffalosat a cost of US$30 000. Another article reported: 'While the conferenceargues about how to save the African elephant from extinction, affluentamateur white hunters from Europe and the United States are joining theivory poachers in the bush and national parklands of in search of theworld's largest land mammal'.2 The article stated that 'a thousand elephantswill be shot in Africa this week alone' and added that elephant herds havebeen reduced from 1,3 million to half that number in ten years.The Times leader on 12 October noted that the arguments for andagainst banning the ivory trade should be judged solely by the criterionmost likely to save the African elephant from extinction and it concludedthat the CITES controls had proved 'horrifyingly ineffective'.3 When theban on ivory sales was agreed, the fact that Zimbabwe, Botswana,Mozambique, Malawi and Burundi would disregard the ban was reportedwith some distaste. The Zimbabwe government's claim that their elephantpopulation was well managed, and had increased from 30 000 to 50 000,was refuted by elephant experts; they rejected the claims on herd sizebecause the Zimbabwe government has never allowed the internationalcommunity to look at the raw data from which the calculations are made;and it was claimed that animals in herds from Botswana and Angola whichwere regularly crossing the border were being counted and that deadanimals were being included.4* Throughout this article the word 'Europeans' refers to residents of Europe, not residentsof Zimbabwe of European descent.1 The Times, 12 Oct. 1989, 5. 2 Ibid., 1.3 Ibid., 15. * Ibid., 12 Oct. 1989, 5.161162 CONSERVATION IN ZIMBABWE AS SEEN BY EUROPEANSThe initial articles were emotive and not particularly informativeHowever, by 13 October more information began to emerge. It was reportedthat the reason why Zimbabwe supported hunting was to provide monevfor local communities and the game parks. A table of the trophy fees waspublished showing how costly hunting licences are.5 The situation inSouth Africa, Zimbabwe and Botswana (where, it was said, careful controlsexisted and where there is a flourishing population of elephants whichoften have to be culled) was compared to the situation in Kenya, wherebecause of a lack of controls, the elephant and rhino population have allbut disappeared.The arguments then centered on the black rhino.6 A report thatZimbabwe was considering restarting the outlawed trade in rhino hornwas swiftly condemned by the World Wide Fund for Nature as 'catastrophic'It was pointed out that the black rhino population had been reduced from65 000 to some 4 000 in the last twenty years. Statements from Zimbabweanrepresentatives quoted were 'the black rhino is an animal of no valuewhatsoever, except perhaps for tourism, with a huge conservation cost'and 'hunting is not a barbaric sport. The animals are a form of renewableresource and hunting is a form of recreation.' These remarks were poorlvreceived. However, not all was bad news Š one well-known rhino expert(who preferred not to be named because of the highly emotive natureofthe debate) noted that 'a total ban on the horn trade had not stopped thepoaching.... Pure protectionists forget about the huge costs of conservation... if Zimbabwe does not get the cash for a shot rhino or elephant thPpoachers will.'7 H cIt was at this stage that I offered to present a lecture on the subject ofEuropeans' views on conservation in Zimbabwe. At the time it seemed aneasy subject Š there were at least two or three articles in the Dress eachday on the subject and readers' letters began to come in. It seemed that aI needed to do was to collect newspaper articles and the lecture would bewritten. However, the European press works in a strange way A great dealof attention is given to the 'flavour of the day' and then, suddenly attentionturns to the next topic. In view of the dramatic events taking place inEastern Europe, it was not surprising when the subject was droDDedabruptly at the end of the CITES conference. The few letters that dMappear were either well argued and informed or of the 'I must record mvoutrage and disgust...' or 'How can people in their right minds ...' typeTHE QUESTIONNAIREIn view of the coverage in the press, I decided to wait a few weeks and thento use a questionnaire to establish the views of Europeans on conservationin Zimbabwe and how they had been affected by this coverageTtaquestionnaire (see Appendix 1) was in four parts. Part 1 established somepersonal details (age, sex and nationality) to allow some manlpuSlSrf5 Ibid., 13 Oct., 1989,3. * ibid , 37 Ibid., 14 Oct. 1989,3. " ' 'R. K. RYLATT 163data around these characteristics. The main objective of Part 2 was toensure that respondents were thinking of the right country. Zimbabwe is,after all, a long way from Europe and I was not at all sure of the level ofEuropeans' knowledge of Zimbabwe. (In this respect I was pleasantlysurprised by the relatively high level of awareness shown in the responses.)This section also served to obtain a indication of views on Zimbabwe ingeneral. The objective of Part 3 was to test opinions and understanding ongeneral conservation issues. Part 4 looked for opinions on specific issuesdealing with conservation in Zimbabwe.The intention was to look for informed opinion rather than a statisticallysound cross-section of the European population; therefore, the question-naire was given out to fairly carefully selected small groups of universitystudents and lecturers, private-school pupils and teachers, middle man-agers in industry, professional staff and their spouses.About 160 copies of the questionnaire were distributed and 120 werecompleted and returned. The nationalities of those who sent returnsincluded 75 Britons, 25 Dutch and about 20 other European nationalities(Danish, German, Belgian, Austrian, Swiss and Norwegian). The percentagereturns were rather high (approximately 75 per cent), probably becauseof the high level of interest in the subject. In a number of cases I receivedcompleted photocopies of the original questionnaire from those who hadnot been sent copies. There were also a handful of responses from peopleoutside Europe which, although their responses were similar to thosefrom Europeans, have been excluded from the analysis.As a test, some questionnaires were given to a group of people whocould be expected to be less well informed than the people previouslymentioned. There were no returns from this group.BASIC INFORMATIONOne hundred and twenty completed questionnaires could hardly be con-sidered as a statistically sound representation of the views of severalhundred million Europeans. However, they did give a good insight andcontained some surprising information. The sample was biased towardsmales (2:1) and the over-50 age group was not well represented. However,there were no major observable differences in opinion between the agegroups or the sexes. There were some interesting, but relatively minor,differences between the views of Britons and other Europeans.So what do Europeans know about Zimbabwe? The majority appear tobe much more informed than I had previously thought. The original in-ention had been to exclude those returns not clearly identifying Zimbabwe,but this was not necessary. It is true that some could not accurately namea country bordering Zimbabwe and if all the responses were includedZimbabwe would occupy a great portion of Africa (see Fig. 1). However,the answers to the combination of general questions on Zimbabwe made Itclear that all the respondents had the right country in mind even if someof them were not really sure where it was.The general view on the size of Zimbabwe's population was that it issomewhat larger than it in fact is (Fig. 2). While almost 50 per cent of the164 CONSERVATION IN ZIMBABWE AS SEEN BY EUROPEANSFiOfire 1 Ł RESPONDENTS' VIEW OF WHICH COUNTRIES AREZIMBABWE'S NEIGHBOURSsample correctly identified the population of Zimbabwe to be between sixand ten million, 30 per cent, believed Zimbabwe to have ten to twentymillion people. Of the remainder only 4 per cent did not respond and theother responses were evenly split between less than 5 million and greaterthan 20 million. In terms of Zimbabwe's neighbours, 42 per cent identifiedZimbabwe most strongly with South Africa, 17 per cent Zambia, 10 percent Mozambique and only 4 per cent mentioned Botswana. Not surpris-ingly, 1 in 10 could not name a neighbouring country (Fig. 3). Although Iasked respondents not to rush to the nearest atlas before replying, thereis no guarantee that they obeyed this request.When it came to identifying the main export of Zimbabwe, a numberwere clearly misled by the questionnaire into identifying ivory as theZimbabwe's main export (Fig. 4). All but 14 per cent of the respondents feltable to give (or guess) an answer. Tobacco was the most popular answer(17 per cent), with copper, mineral ores, agricultural produce all beingbunched together with 12 per cent. Coffee (11 per cent) and ivory (10 percent) were also popular answers, with precious metal, coal, diamonds, oil,meat, skins and tourism also being mentioned.,I consider these to bereasonable set of responses considering that most Europeans would notbe able to name the main export of their own country.The responses to the question on what associations people had aboutZimbabwe were rather illuminating (Fig. 5). It was the answers to thisquestion that persuaded me to include the data from all the returns,particularly since only 2 respondents felt unable to answer this question.R. K. RYLATT165Figure 2: RESPONDENTS' ESTIMATES OF ZIMBABWE'S POPULATIONNo view (3,6 %)>20 million (8,0 %)< 5 million (9,8 %)11-20 million (30,4%)6-10 Million (48.2%)Figure 3: RESPONDENTS' VIEW OF ZIMBABWE'S NEIGHBOURSOthers (15,2%)No view (11,6%)Botswana (4,5 %)Mozambique (9,8 %)South Africa (42,0 %)Zambia (17,0%)166CONSERVATION IN ZIMBABWE AS SEEN BY EUROPEANSFigure 4: RESPONDENTS' VIEWS ON ZIMBABWE'S EXPORTSIvory (10,1 %)Tobacco (17,3%)Skins (0Meat (1,4%)Oil (0,7 %)Diamonds (2,2 %)Coal (2,2 %)Preciousmetals (3,6 %)Copper (12,2%)Minerals/ores (12,2%)Agricultural produce (11,5 %)Figure 5: RESPONDENTS' ASSOCIATIONS WITH ZIMBABWECold (11,8%)Neutral (14,2 %)hot climate,tribal customsAfrica, huntiipoverty,rich White/poor Black divide,AIDS/disease,poachers,dangerous animals,wild jungleWarm (33,1 %)wildlife, game parks'Victoria Falls,Zambezi river,savannah, highlands,potentialPolitical (40,9 %)UDI, Smith, war,Rhodes, Rhodesia,Mugabe,Marxism,lost opportunityR. K. RYLATT .167Most of the associations were political or historical (41 per cent) mentioningRhodes, Rhodesia, the struggle for Independence, the Unilateral Declarationof Independence and Mugabe. I do not find this surprising as the vastmajority of the European news about Zimbabwe over the last ten to fifteenyears has been about political issues. However, the under-21 age grouphave a totally different association with Zimbabwe and less than 10 percent mentioned anything to do with politics.Of the remaining associations mentioned, 33 per cent were 'warm' orpleasant associations Š with wildlife, animals, game parks, Victoria Falls,and the Zambezi River being the most mentioned associations. About 12per cent were 'cold', being relatively unpleasant associations with povertyand the rich-poor divide appearing most frequently. So the general viewof Zimbabwe is that it is an ex-colonial nation, which struggled for inde-pendence and political control and is now a Black African country withsome potential. Its particular advantages are climate, the beauty of thescenery and its natural resources which are different from those in Europe.CONSERVATIONConcern with conservation of the environment and wildlife is now a majorissue in Europe, so it was not surprising to find that no one admitted thatconservation was unimportant and that there were only 5 per cent 'don'tknows'. Of the respondents 40 per cent had major concerns about conser-vation and 55 per cent had some concerns. While this level of response isencouraging it remains to be seen how strongly Europeans will react tothe situation in Zimbabwe.In the minds of Europeans, elephants and rhino are definitelyendangered species (see Fig. 6). Virtually everyone identified the elephantas being endangered, with the rhino close behind (85 per cent of therespondents). The majority also identified tiger (63 per cent), cheetah (60per cent) and leopard (55 per cent) on the list but thereafter it becamesomewhat hit-and-miss. Several respondents took the easy way out andstated that all the animals listed on the questionnaire were endangered.This probably accounts for the fact that 16 per cent believe impala are anendangered species. Few gave any qualifications to their answers; twonoted that only some species of the tiger were endangered.IVORY SALESWhen asked to give a reason why they thought Zimbabwe did not supportthe conference decision to ban the sale of ivory the answers given werecrystal clear Š only two respondents were unable to give an answer. Themajority (63 per cent) quite clearly felt that the sale of ivory was animportant source of national revenue that the government did not wish tolose. While many qualified their answer by saying that the country desper-ately needed foreign-currency revenue, it was clear that these respondentsconsidered the stance taken by Zimbabwe to be for political reasons or forrevenue rather than for conservation. Just over 20 per cent stated that168 CONSERVATION IN ZIMBABWE AS SEEN BY EUROPEANSFigure 6: RESPONDENTS' PERCEPTIONS ON ENDANGERED SPECIES55h pmbabwe has a sound management programme of theelephant population, that the sale of ivory is a bonus which providedrevenue for conservation projects and that, therefore, Zimbabwe's stancer^nnO?hnSnrV,aK°n^edHreSpOnse- The other main attitude' fo«nd chieflyTo trff H a1"1 Bntons, was that a ban on ivory sales would drivethe trade underground causing a rise in the price of ivory thus makingpoaching more profitable. One or two people felt that the reason fo?efXvT S G ^ Se a ban °n 1VO^ sales was not Practical orMore than two thirds (67 per cent) of the responses supported theshould continue provided they could be legally channelled andI contrS.R. K. RYLATT 169There were a number of qualifications to the answers here ('if humane', 'ifcontrolled', 'profits cannot accrue to poachers', 'providing all profits areused for conservation', etc.)- The Dutch were more positive on controlledsales with half giving support. A small number (2 per cent) believed it wasnot practical to implement any ban.WHY IS ZIMBABWE CULLING ELEPHANTS?The responses to this question were a little more varied although 70 percent responded with various combinations of the following: 'It is a measureto avoid habitat destruction by controlling the elephant population.' 'Thesale of ivory adds to the national income.' 'The sale of ivory providesincome for conservation.'The Dutch responses were virtually unanimous in this respect (almostcertainly influenced by a Dutch television programme on elephant man-agement during the period that the survey was being carried out Š butwith up to sixteen different channels available is it possible that the wholeDutch nation watched this programme?).A relatively large proportion (16 per cent) of the total respondents feltculling was purely commercial to obtain stocks of ivory for sale. The otherresponses (totalling 14 per cent) included: 'There are no reasonable excusesfor killing animals at all.' 'To stop the poachers killing the animals first.''Competition with man for the land.'When asked to state a personal view on culling there was obviously agreat deal of heart-searching and almost 20 per cent were unable toanswer. Even though 42 per cent of those who did respond believedculling to be acceptable to save the majority, there was again a great dealof qualification to the answer ('if humane', 'if controlled', 'if planned', etc.).The second largest group were those who did not support culling forany reason. Once again the 30 per cent who gave this answer did so withsuch emotive words as 'immoral', 'unnecessary', and 'evil'. The continentalEuropeans in the survey particularly condemned culling with three-quarterstaking this view. One person in 10 believed culling should be curbed andthat resources should be employed to move the animals to an area whereoverpopulation was not a problem. A similar percentage (all of themBritons) failed to see any reason at all for culling animals. The remaininganswers suggested pointing guns at poachers and not animals, elephantfarming, or moving people away from parks areas to make more room forthe animals!HUNTING AND POACHINGThe subject of hunting provided something of a surprise. In total almosttwo thirds supported hunting, this being particularly true of the ContinentalEuropeans. The British were more reserved but even so support outweigheddislike of hunting. Although 17 per cent gave relatively unqualified supportfor hunting ('fine', 'better than poaching', 'full support especially if revenuesare channelled to conservation'), the majority qualified their answers by170 CONSERVATION IN ZIMBABWE AS SEEN BY EUROPEANSsaying hunting was acceptable if it was 'recorded', 'controlled', 'humane','applied only to non-endangered species', etc.Many of the 37 per cent who condemned hunting did so for emotionalreasons, seeing hunting as 'commercial', 'barbaric', 'repulsive', 'inhumane'and 'unnecessary'. Surprisingly, there were few abstentions from the questionon hunting.There were more surprises on the subject of shooting poachers. Over45 per cent of the responses gave support with varying degrees of quali-fication; just under 33 per cent disagreed with hunting and the remainderwere undecided. Of the supporters, 24 per cent saw shooting poachers asa better form of hunting Š the poachers know what they are doing; afurther 14 per cent agreed without any qualification; 8 per cent disagreedon principle but added that it was a desperate situation warrantingdesperate solutions. At the other end of the scale 18 per cent used languagelike 'hypocritical', 'outrageous', 'illegal', in condemning the shooting ofpoachers. A further 13 per cent believed in the education of poachers,catching, trying and passing sentence on poachers, apprehending thedealers, making poaching unattractive, or putting in more resources tomake poaching unnecessary.The fence-sitters believed that shooting was too severe a punishmentbut that a hard line (unspecified) was needed which should be used onlyas a last resort or in self-defence. Once again there were only a handfulwho did not respond to this question.THE EFFECTS OF TOURISM ON CONSERVATIONClearly, respondents were on safer ground in answering this question andeverybody answered it (see Fig. 7). Just under 50 per cent viewed tourismas entirely beneficial as it benefits the tourist through education andrelaxation, and leads to an increased awareness of and outside pressurefor conservation. It benefits the country by generating income for thenational economy. It also benefits conservation by channelling incomeinto game reserves.On the other hand, 11 per cent saw tourism in a totally adverse lightas it encourages ivory sales, may disturb the environment and may causeanimal migration. It also causes secondary damage as tourists want com-fortable hotels and souvenir (and other) shops. In any case tourists showan interest only in the 'exciting' animals.Fully 40 per cent saw tourism as being double-edged, containing allthe good and bad elements just described. The general view emergingfrom this group of respondents was that tourism needs careful managementto ensure that it can be of long-term benefit to the country, to the animalsand to the tourists themselves. In summary: 'Don't spoil it.'IS ZIMBABWE CONSERVATION CONSCIOUS?Nearly 55 per cent of the respondents did not answer this question. Ofthose who did give an answer, two thirds felt that Zimbabwe was con-servation minded, the remainder did not. This lack of a clear view indicatedR. K. RYLATT 171Figure 7: RESPONDENTS' VIEWS ON CONSERVATIONNo view (5,4 %)Unimportant (0 %)Minor (55,4 %)Major (39,3 %)that many respondents were formulating their views for the first time.Many of the earlier answers were crossed out and re-written as respondentsreally thought out the implications of the subject and changed their minds.Several actually admitted that their answers to later questions had causedthem to change their minds on the earlier ones.Apart from the general view that the sale of ivory should be banned,the October newspaper articles did not seem to have had more than aminor impact on public opinion. Nevertheless, people were much moreaware of the problem of elephant conservation than I had anticipated. Idiscussed the matter further with some of the respondents within easyreach. Most had not seen the articles in the newspaper but had seenreports on television during the CITES conference. Television coveragewas muted compared to that of the press and less emphasis was placed onthe national positions of the affected countries. A greater degree ofemphasis was placed on poaching, which was covered somewhat graphi-cally. I believe that this caused the surprising views given by respondentson the shooting of poachers. Furthermore, television wildlife programmesare extremely popular and informative. The combination of pictorial andverbal information gives television an edge over the press in the retentionof knowledge and the forming of opinion.CONCLUSIONThe questionnaire generated a great deal of interest. More than 50 percent of the respondents asked for a copy of the findings. Since an inform-ation sheet (see Appendix B) was given out to all the respondents after the172 CONSERVATION IN ZIMBABWE AS SEEN BY EUROPEANScompletion of the questionnaire, there are at least 120 Europeans who aremuch more aware of the subject than they were before. There is also oneEuropean and his wife who have enjoyed researching and writing thisarticle.APPENDIX 1: QUESTIONNAIRE1. General (please tick)(a) Age Under21 (b) Sex Male (c) Nationality.22-50 FemaleOver 502. What you know about Zimbabwe?(a) Do you have any personal connection with Zimbabwe (family, friends,etc.)?(b) How many people do you think live in Zimbabwe?Less than 5 million 6-10 million11-20 million More than 2Q million(c) Can you name one of the countries bordering Zimbabwe?(d) What is Zimbabwe's main export?(e) What comes into your mind when you think of Zimbabwe?3. Conservation in general(a) How conservation minded are you? (please tick one)Have major concerns Have no strong viewHave some concerns Conservation not important.R. K. RYLATT 173(b) Which of the following are endangered species?Baboon Elephant LeopardBear Giraffe LionCamel Hedgehog TigerCheetah Hippo RhinoCrocodile Impala Wildebeest.Zebra4. Zimbabwe and conservation(a) Do you believe Zimbabwe is conservation conscious?Yes No view No(b) A recent International Conference banned sales of ivory; Zimbabwe didnot want this. Can you give a reason why they might have taken thisposition?(c) What is your view on the sale of ivory? .(d) Zimbabwe is currently culling elephants in some of its nature reserves.Can you think of a reason why they are doing that?What is your view?.(e) Zimbabwe allows hunting of wild animals in some of its reserves.What is your view?(f) Zimbabwe is combating poaching to the extent of shooting poachers.What is your view?(g) What effect do you think tourism has on conservation of wildlife?174 CONSERVATION IN ZIMBABWE AS SEEN BY EUROPEANSAPPENDIX 2: INFORMATION SHEETThank you for completing the questionnaire. If your interest has been arousedthe following may be helpful.Zimbabwe (formerly Southern Rhodesia) is bordered by South Africa,Botswana, Mozambique and Zambia. Some 8,5 million people (1986 estimate)live in the country which has an area of 150 000 square miles or 1,5 times thesize of the UK. The main export is tobacco.The main thoughts you might have had about Zimbabwe are: Victoria Falls,Zambezi River, Kariba Dam (all shared with Zambia), Stanley and Livingstone,the Zimbabwe Ruins, UDI and the struggle for Independence, Mugabe andNkomo.Endangered species from the list are: Cheetah, Elephant, Rhino, Tiger butGiraffe (outside East Africa), Leopard (some species) and Zebra (2 out of 3species) are also on the endangered species list.Elephant remain abundant in the Zimbabwe nature reserves. If there are toomany elephants they start to destroy their own environment and that is whyculling is carried out in some areas. Poaching is the main problem for elephantand rhino owing to the value of ivory and rhino horn. This is why the Zimbabweanauthorities are vigorously combating poaching in the national game reserves.There are two views on the subject of ivory which expressed simply are: (1)By stopping trade, ivory will become worthless and as a result poaching willcease, and (2) By stopping official trading, the black market value of ivory willincrease causing an increase in poaching.It remains to be seen which view is correct, but Zimbabwe takes the latterview. Furthermore, if they are forced to control the elephant population, they seethe sale of ivory as revenue to pay for costly anti-poaching measures.Hunting is a means to gain foreign currency, desperately needed by mostAfrican nations. Hunting licences are extremely expensive. It does, however,cause a tremendous reaction against those countries still allowing hunting ofanimals.Tourism is double-edged. On the one hand it allows us to see wild animals intheir own environment and is a powerful source of foreign currency. On the otherhand too many tourists will destroy the natural environment. The challenge is tofi"d the right balance.