African Parks show excellent progress in latest monthly reports

African Parks, responsible for the management of 3 of Malawi’s major national parks and wildlife reserves, have shared their recent developments in their latest monthly reports (August 2022). In this article, we summarise our favourite highlights from each report.

Liwonde National Park, often considered Malawi’s premier wildlife location, had a very successful month. Always looking forward, they have completed their 5 year business plan from 2023 – 2027. Their work within communities saw twenty meetings conducted on preparation of tree nurseries. Ten community meetings also took place with 10 boxes on grievance mechanisms recruited around the Park. African Parks purchased 5kgs of honey from local farmers, with two hives and six catch boxes also colonised. Their conservation work saw two pangolins released back into the wild, one into Liwonde National Park and one into Mangochi Forest Reserve, an annex to the west of the main park. Forty five arrests were made during the month for tree cutting, poaching and illegal fishing, which all contributes to the park thriving for years to come. Recruitment for their field Ranger Course which took place in September was also a success.

Nkhotakota Wildlife Reserve, in Central Malawi, also saw a busy month with plenty of goals achieved.Ten elephants were collared for monitoring. Elephants, buffalo, impala, bushbuck, Common Duiker, warthog, waterbuck, kudu and zebra were sighted during most patrols. An increase in animal sightings have been observed in the lower Bua area with credit to the recent animal translocations. In the local communities, African Parks have held twelve meetings in which 1126 people attended. They have also supervised irrigation farming progress in Mthyoka village, established poultry kraals in readiness for poultry farming in Kapichila and goat pass-on farmers meetings were held in Chikoko and Mtanda areas. African Parks have also continued many other community projects. Basic Ranger Training saw 30 recruits selected out of 104 applicants, with a second selection phase now due at Chipata. A staff workshop took place to work on their five year business plan for 2023-2027.

Majete Wildlife Reserve, in South Malawi continued their excellent development work as seen in this latest report. In their conservation news, they collared two lions which can now be monitored. They successfully captured game to be translocated to Liwonde and Nkhotakota parks. 130 individual giraffes, including 15 sightings of calves, were counted among the 33 giraffe sightings that were reported. After the reintroduction of giraffe to Majete in 2018, this is a great progression as the population continues to grow. 64 individual lions were also sighted within this month’s report, with 11 separate occasions of wild dog sightings also taking place. Their law enforcement saw fifteen long patrols take place for rhino monitoring, with 410 man days achieved on patrols, an increase of 4% from the previous month. Two weeks training for dogs and dog handlers was also arranged and conducted by Eco Defence Group. In their community work, eleven meetings were held in which they discussed development issues, poaching and charcoal burning issues. 5993 people were in attendance in these meetings. The park hosted eight school wildlife clubs, in which students learned about wildlife conservation.

For the full reports, click the following links:

Liwonde Monthly Report

Nkhotakota Monthly Report

Majete Monthly Report