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The opportunity to encounter wildlife, especially endangered species, has long been a major tourism draw for countries around the world with demand continuing to grow. Yet direct evidence testing the underlaying assumptions of tourism as a wildlife conservation strategy has been more limited particularly where tourism benefits are assumed to “trickle down” to rural communities that foster local stewardship. A long-term case study from north-west Namibia's communal lands presents and evaluates a theory of change for a community-level black rhinoceros conservation tourism model that explicitly incorporates local values and institutions in design expected to deliver results that enhance local-level stewardship and improving conservation outcomes for the population. Between 2012 and 2018, the numbers of tourists participating in and revenue generated from local ranger-based rhinoceros viewing encounters directly to local community institutions increased dramatically by over 200% with over USD $1,000,000 generated during the 6 year period. Subsequent community re-investments in rhinoceros protection was evidenced by a 340% increase in the employment of local “Rhino Rangers” during the same period. Further, a strong positive relationship between community institutions that directly provide support to and benefit financially from tourism with the level of their reinvestment in rhinoceros conservation suggest that communities that benefited more from rhinoceros-based tourism demonstrated higher levels of stewardship. A strong negative relationship observed between rates of illegal hunting of the rhinoceros population and the level of local rhinoceros protection efforts suggest that the increase in local stewardship likely contributed to the reduction in illegal hunting. The Namibia Conservancy-led rhino conservation tourism case offers evidence and lessons that illustrate how carefully curated wildlife tourism that is designed specifically with community engagement and empowerment in mind may serve as a strong basis for enhanced local stewardship that helps improve wildlife and local human communities.

The black rhinoceros (rhino) (Diceros bicornis) is critically endangered, with poaching being one of several threats to the species’ survival. Many reserves across several countries, including Namibia, South Africa, and Zimbabwe, now dehorn their rhinos in an attempt to reduce poaching. Historical data collected by the Namibian Ministry of Environment, Forestry, and Tourism and Save the Rhino Trust were used to investigate whether dehorning has an effect on age at first reproduction (AFR), inter-calving interval (ICI), birth sex ratios, calf survival, cause of death, and lifespan. These were assessed in four Namibian sub-populations (hereafter referred to as ‘populations’) of black rhino (denoted A, B, C, and D) which have undergone varying levels of dehorning. No significant difference was found in any of the variables between dehorned and horned individuals. Population was a significant predictor of AFR (LRT = 7.433, p = 0.024) and ICI (LRT = 13.281, p = 0.004), although pairwise comparisons only found populations A and B to be significantly different (AFR: z = −2.736, p = 0.017, ICI: z = −3.705, p = 0.001). Additionally, a significantly higher number of males than females were born in population D (p = 0.021, CI = 0.544, 0.960). The main cause of death across all individuals was poaching, although there was no significant difference in the proportion of rhinos poached between dehorned and horned individuals (X2 = 0.638, p = 0.424, n = 265). No evidence was found to suggest that dehorning has any effect on AFR, ICI, birth sex ratios, calf survival, or lifespan in the black rhino, which is reassuring in the continued use of dehorning as an anti-poaching technique in this species.

The black rhinoceros (rhino) (

Wildlife-based tourism poses opportunities and challenges for species conservation. Minimizing potential negative impacts of tourism is critical to ensure business and conservation enterprises can coexist. In north-western Namibia tourism is used as a conservation tool for the Critically Endangered black rhinoceros Diceros bicornis. However, black rhinoceroses are susceptible to human disturbance and may become displaced by tourist activities, which threatens not only the security and health of the rhinoceros population but also the sustainability of the business. We examined areas avoided by black rhinoceroses to understand how they respond to the type and extent of tourism development, and to evaluate management alternatives. We used spatial data on use of water sources by rhinoceroses to create a series of a priori candidate models that described the negative influences of tourist activities on rhinoceros habitat use. A model selection approach strongly supported a cumulative zones of influence model comprised of a 6 km buffer around the airstrip combined with a 1 km buffer around roads used daily. We compared alternative management scenarios using the best-performing model and found that an optimal road-use policy combined with airstrip relocation could minimize the total area avoided by the black rhinoceros to 7.1% and loss of high quality habitat to 20.7%. Under the worst-case scenario the area avoided and loss of high quality habitat were 153 and 85% greater, respectively, than under the scenario with optimal management. Our findings provide a novel framework and a practical, policy-relevant decision support tool to improve the contribution of tourism to wildlife conservation.

Expanding human populations, combined with an increasingly variable climate, present challenges to the conservation of wide-ranging wildlife species, particularly for populations that persist in human-dominated landscapes. Although the movements and space use of many equid species have been well studied, comparable research of the Hartmann’s mountain zebra (HMZ) Equus zebra hartmannae, which primarily inhabits communal and commercial farming areas of Namibia, has been scarce and may limit conservation effectiveness. Here, we investigated the environmental and anthropogenic factors influencing HMZ movements and resource use across a large area of their range in northwestern Namibia. We deployed 6 GPS collars on HMZ during 2011 to 2013 and used integrated step selection functions to quantify HMZ movements and space use. HMZ movements averaged ~5 km d-1, and mean seasonal home range sizes were 681 and 256 km2 in the wet and dry season, respectively. HMZ selected for areas with high normalized difference vegetation index values (used as a proxy for primary production), particularly during the dry season, while avoiding areas further from water and closer to human settlements, although the effect was less apparent during the rainy season. Movement rates increased when HMZ crossed roads and were closer to roadways, but rates were not impacted by proximity to human activities. These results provide insights toward mitigating human-HMZ conflict. We highlight the difficulty a changing and less predictable climate creates for grazing species living in arid regions, as they must expend more energy and navigate dangers of a growing human footprint to seek out valuable but ephemeral forage.

The forage maturation hypothesis (FMH) states that energy intake for ungulates is maximised when forage biomass is at intermediate levels. Nevertheless, metabolic allometry and different digestive systems suggest that resource selection should vary across ungulate species. By combining GPS relocations with remotely sensed data on forage characteristics and surface water, we quantified the effect of body size and digestive system in determining movements of 30 populations of hindgut fermenters (equids) and ruminants across biomes. Selection for intermediate forage biomass was negatively related to body size, regardless of digestive system. Selection for proximity to surface water was stronger for equids relative to ruminants, regardless of body size. To be more generalisable, we suggest that the FMH explicitly incorporate contingencies in body size and digestive system, with small-bodied ruminants selecting more strongly for potential energy intake, and hindgut fermenters selecting more strongly for surface water.

Relatively few studies have examined how the degree of involvement of local communities in nature‐based tourism, and the benefits that are generated for them, impact the choices that tourists make when visiting developing countries. We surveyed over 400 visitors in multiple locations in Namibia, using a discrete choice experiment to elicit preferences for attributes reflecting tracking safaris of the critically endangered, desert‐adapted black rhinoceros (Diceros bicornis bicornis) in the northwest of the country. Attributes included those related to local community involvement and the benefits they receive from tourism, as well as the reinvestment of tourism profits back into rhino conservation, and the wildlife likely to be seen on safari. Using a latent class model that assigned tourists to market segments based on the observed pattern of responses in the choice experiment, we find that respondents can be divided into four classes that reflect differences in tourism preferences and their own demographics and experiences. While responses to attributes varied across classes, respondents were consistent in demonstrating a strong preference for the largest share of profits being returned to the local community, and were willing to pay an additional $43–670 to ensure this happens. Respondents in the four classes differed in their views toward the financing of rhino conservation and the participation of community trackers in rhino safaris, although those respondents in the class most interested in rhino tracking safaris were willing to pay an additional $34 per trip for tracker involvement. Our results demonstrate the value of assessing heterogeneity in tourists' preferences for wildlife experiences, and suggest that appropriate pricing and marketing may result in “triple bottom line” gains for nature‐based tourism.

Tourism may benefit conservation, but some wildlife viewing practices threaten the sustainability of both business and conservation initiatives. In north-west Namibia, conservation-oriented tourism provides tourists with an opportunity to encounter the critically-endangered black rhinoceros Diceros bicornis on foot. We used 123 tourist-rhinoceros encounters and employed a statistical modeling approach to: (1) identify the characteristics of human-rhinoceros encounters that caused rhinoceros disturbance and displacement; and (2) design rhinoceros-human encounter guidelines that improve sustainability. A model-averaging, information-theoretic approach identified tourist approach distance, viewing time and individual encounter exposure as the most significant predictors of rhinoceros disturbance level. A suite of rhinoceros viewing scenarios were modeled for acceptable disturbance risks, and adopted as a rhinoceros viewing policy. The policy reduced encounter displacements by 80% while maintaining a 95% positive feedback rating from guests. We demonstrate an evidence-based, policy-oriented management approach can help improve tourism's contribution towards the conservation of an endangered species.

Wildlife-based tourism is widely promoted as a conservation tool, yet controversy surrounds its net contributions. Procedural problems are under-appreciated and originate from an under-attention to people: their interactions, values at play, and matters of special, shared, and common interests. We offer a case in Namibia of black rhinoceros conservation tourism that attended simultaneously and systematically to the inter-related ecological and social processes involved. We demonstrate how an understanding of social context and the decision making process developed, how outcomes were evaluated and synthesized lessons into prototypic elements as a pneumonic that we term the ‘ACE approach’: (1) establish an Arena for inclusive, open debate; (2) identify and use Conservation-oriented messaging; (3) adopt participatory Evidence-based management for action, feedback, and learning.

In the last decade, poaching of high-profile wildlife species has increased across Africa, particularly threatening the viability of rhinoceros populations. Protection efforts and anti-poaching measures have increased across the continent, but a lack of research on the motivations driving the recruitment of local people by poaching syndicates may limit successful law enforcement. We explore the societal drivers and personal motivations behind individuals' involvement in poaching syndicates in Namibia and how this process is perceived at different levels of decision-making. There was a general consensus across all informant populations that wildlife crime syndicates are divided into five tiers of engagement. Poachers, the lowest tier, are typically recruited by a second tier of local business people via a cycle of dependency and debt. Further, although anti-poaching efforts are generally aimed at apprehending individuals at the lowest tier, the dependency mechanism used by local recruiters supplies syndicates with a consistent source of recruits. We also identified a misalignment of perceptions between local people and socially distant conservation practitioners regarding the personal motivations and societal drivers of commercial poaching. We urge conservation practitioners to invest in developing a more contextual understanding of local perceptions and perspectives prior to establishing rhinoceros protection measures. Such contextual information is critical to ensuring that limited conservation resources are used effectively to achieve the greatest positive impact for both people and rhinoceros.

The rate at which the poaching of rhinoceroses has escalated since 2010 poses a threat to the long-term persistence of extant rhinoceros populations. The policy response has primarily called for increased investment in military-style enforcement strategies largely based upon simple economic models of rational crime. However, effective solutions will probably require a context-specific, stakeholder-driven mix of top-down and bottom-up mechanisms grounded in theory that represents human behaviour more realistically. Using a problem-oriented approach we illustrate in theory and practice how community-based strategies that explicitly incorporate local values and institutions are a foundation for combating rhinoceros poaching effectively in specific contexts. A case study from Namibia demonstrates how coupling a locally devised rhinoceros monitoring regime with joint-venture tourism partnerships as a legitimate land use can reconcile individual values represented within a diverse stakeholder group and manifests as both formal and informal community enforcement. We suggest a social learning approach as a means by which international, national and regional governance can recognize and promote solutions that may help empower local communities to implement rhinoceros management strategies that align individual values with the long-term health of rhinoceros populations.

Curtailing overharvest, whether illegal or legal, is often a critical conservation objective. Yet even if overexploitation can be stopped, subsequent rates of population recovery can be highly variable due to Allee effects, alterations to age and sex structure and disruptions of animal social systems. Moreover, understanding the influence of density dependence can be difficult but important for long-term management. Here, we investigate the dynamics of black rhinoceros Diceros bicornis in the Kunene region of Namibia as they recover from illegal hunting. We use multi-strata mark–recapture models to examine survival and stage-transition rates from 1992 to 2005. Survivorship estimates ranged from 0.793 for calves to 0.910 for adult males and 0.944 for adult females. The annual reproductive rate in adult females was estimated at 0.315. Model selection showed that these vital rates were time invariant, suggesting that Allee effects and transient dynamics did not have an important effect upon population dynamics, even in the early stages of recovery. Relative population density increased significantly from 1992 to 2005 once illegal hunting had ceased in Kunene. However, the best-fit models did not include relative density in the estimation of survival or stagetransition rates. We then used the vital rates generated from our mark–recapture analysis to build matrix projection models that assessed overall population dynamics. The female-only model gave a population growth rate estimate of l = 1.011. Two-sex models suggest that the growth rate of the population could range from 0.990 to 1.012. The relatively slow growth rate of this population, even without hunting or density dependence, could stem from the low productivity of the region. Adult females had the highest reproductive value and their survival had the highest elasticity among vital rates. Translocating adult females would lead to the fastest initial population growth rate in founder populations but would have the most impact on the source population.

Publisher Summary Remnant wildlife habitat is becoming increasingly fragmented and surrounded by people. These landscapes confound and challenge conservation strategies based on modern ecological theory with the sociological realities of relatively higher human densities, less land available for conservation, higher poaching pressure, and less political and financial support for conservation. The tiger, as Asia's dominant predator, is impacted the most by these changes. Where forests remain and government commitment is assured, it is important to focus conservation attention on the largest remaining wilderness landscapes. The attention and investments accompanying tiger conservation and recovery efforts can leverage other conservation efforts if priority recovery sites are strategically aligned with persisting biological refugia. Scaled-down sub-regional approach to prioritizing tiger conservation efforts needs to be embedded within larger conservation strategy frameworks. As China is increasingly concerned about its image, and is commonly cited as being the single largest threat to tiger survival, opportunities exist to change cultural attitudes, especially in the younger generation through future engagement in conservation employment in nature-based tourism, plant and animal rehabilitation, or simply through the unrivaled education that only a wild landscape can provide.

Publisher Summary This chapter reviews the status of captive and a wild tiger in China, describes efforts to restore wild tiger populations in China, and discusses the significant ramifications for tiger conservation throughout Asia. In Chinese philosophy, the universe consists of two opposing but complementary forces: yin and yang. Yin is symbolized by water and earth, and yang by fire and air; yin is dark, and yang is light. This concept of opposite but complementary forces can be applied as well to tiger conservation in modern China. One side is a degraded landscape devoid of wild tigers, the other is a farm bloated with captive tigers; wild tigers are poached, captive tigers are bred. China is fundamentally responsible for fueling the global trade in illegal tiger parts, yet it has an emerging, powerful political mandate to resurrect the tiger as a symbol of wilderness. A scientifically rigorous strategy designed to secure the tiger's future on a meaningful scale in southern China is urgently needed. China can continue to ignore growing global criticism of its domestic wildlife policies, and accept the damage to its international reputation, or it can take proactive measures to legitimately become Asia's tiger problem solver. The future of tigers and much of Asia's biodiversity may hinge on this decision.

This paper describes results of a Sino-American field survey seeking evidence of South China tigers Panthera tigris amoyensis in the wild. In 2001 and 2002 field surveys were conducted in eight reserves in five provinces identified by government authorities as habitat most likely to contain tigers. The surveys evaluated and documented evidence for the presence of tigers, tiger prey and habitat disturbance. Approximately 290 km of mountain trails were evaluated. Infrared remote cameras set up in two reserves captured 400 trap days of data. Thirty formal and numerous informal interviews were conducted with villagers to document wildlife knowledge, livestock management practices, and local land and resource use. We found no evidence of wild South China tigers, few prey species, and no livestock depredation by tigers reported in the last 10 years. Forest areas designated as tiger reserves, averaging about 100 km2 in size, are too small to support even a few tigers because commercial tree farms and other habitat conversion is common, and people and their livestock dominate these fragments. While our survey may not have been exhaustive, and there may be a single tiger or a few isolated tigers still remaining at sites we missed, our results strongly indicate that no remaining viable populations of South China tigers occur within its historical range. We conclude that continued field efforts are needed to ascertain whether any wild tigers may yet persist, concurrent with the need to consider options for the eventual recovery and restoration of wild tiger populations from existing captive populations.

Human-caused biodiversity loss is a global problem, large carnivores are particularly threatened, and the tiger ( Panthera tigris ) is among the world’s most endangered large carnivores. The South China tiger ( Panthera tigris amoyensis ) is the most critically endangered tiger subspecies and is considered functionally extinct in the wild. The government of China has expressed its intent to reintroduce a small population of South China tigers into a portion of their historic range as part of a larger goal to recover wild tiger populations in China. This would be the world’s first major tiger reintroduction program. A free-ranging population of 15–20 tigers living in a minimum of 1000 km 2 of habitat was identified as a target. We assessed summer and winter habitat suitability of two critical prey species, wild boar ( Sus scrofa ) and Sika deer ( Cervus nippon ), using GIS spatial models to evaluate the potential for tiger reintroduction in one likely candidate site, the 1100 km 2 Hupingshan–Houhe National Nature Reserve complex in Hunan and Hubei Provinces, China. Our preliminary analysis estimates that for wild boar, potential summer and winter habitat availability is 372–714 km 2 and 256–690 km 2 , respectively, whereas for Sika deer, potential summer and winter habitat availability is 443–747 km 2 and 257–734 km 2 , respectively. Our model identifies potential priority areas for release and restoration of prey between 195 and 790 km 2 with a carrying capacity of 596–2409 wild boar and 468–1929 Sika deer. Our analysis suggests that Hupingshan–Houhe could support a small population of 2–9 tigers at a density of 1.1–1.2 tigers/100 km 2 following prey and habitat restorations. Thus, current habitat quality and area would fall short of the target recovery goal. We identify major challenges facing a potential tiger reintroduction project and conclude that restoring the habitat and prey base, addressing concerns of local people, and enhancing coordination across park boundaries are significant challenges to meeting the broader goals of supporting a reintroduced wild tiger population. Tiger range states have committed to doubling the world’s wild tigers by 2022. The results of this study have implications for China’s commitment to this goal and for the future of tiger and other large carnivore reintroduction efforts in Asia and globally.