wildlife conservation
Protecting african wildlife
One of our main objectives and driving motives, at Try Zimbabwe, is the conservation of wildlife. We are against the killing of any wildlife by human beings for any reason whatsoever. We believe that Africa’s wildlife are one of the planet’s greatest and priceless resources.
The reality is that Africa’s wildlife is facing a genocide. The voiceless African wildlife is being decimated at a commercial rate. In isolation poaching and animal killing is rampant. Each year, at least 20,000 African elephants and many other animals are illegally killed by poachers seeking ivory, meat and body parts.
We believe in an interconnected approach to conservation with international tourists at the center of successfully protecting our animals and increasing their population. Through maintaining our large herds of prey species, carnivores thrive. Tourists and wildlife enthusiasts from all over the planet visit and through park fees, they pay for the rangers who keep poachers at bay and remove snares. Our tourists are a physical deterrent; with them there are more eyes on the poachers and more funding to stop them. The income raised from the international tourists also funds many programs that benefit the locals who also learn to see wildlife as a valuable resource instead of bush meat. Once you start losing animals to poaching, travelers lose interest in the area and the economy suffers. Any efforts at wildlife conservation that doesn’t include locals will quickly be undermined by locals. Our approach is truly wholistic and interconnected.
There are three main types of enemies to wildlife that we have to eliminate:
- The local small-scale poachers who kill wildlife for bush meat,
- The trophy hunter who pays thousands of dollars to kill our wildlife
- Sophisticated poachers funded by international black market demand. For example, rhino poaching is being driven by the demand for the rhino horn in Asian countries, particularly China and Viet Nam. The rhino horn is used in Traditional Chinese Medicine, but increasingly common is its use as a status symbol to display success and wealth.
Africa’s population is projected to double in size by 2050, and with growing habitat fragmentation, habitat loss and poaching, the future for wildlife looks bleak when conservation is taken out of the equation. Our work, at Try Zimbabwe, is ever more important. Through our safari packages we create opportunities for couples, families and fellow animal enthusiasts from all over the world to visit the animals they love in the most luxurious manner