The key threats affecting the survival of elephants in Murchison Falls National Park

Abstract

Globally, the elephant is classified as vulnerable and this has resulted into because of high levels of commercial poaching largely attributed to illegal trade in ivory and its products exacerbated by habitat degradation and loss mainly due to land use changes driven by an increased human population in the region. This has put the elephant population to trend downwards globally with a few exceptions of local populations. I conducted this study to assess the key threats affecting the survival of elephants in Murchison falls national park. To do this, between February 2021 and February 2022, I interviewed 36 respondents using a questionnaire survey and made a field survey of elephants in the northern corridor of MFNP. The north eastern region had lowest percentage (4.19 %) of elephants during the wet season while during the dry season, it had the highest percentage (60.98 %) of elephants. The Tangi region had the second highest percentage (31.74 %) of elephants during the wet season while during the dry season, it had the lowest percentage (9.60 %) of elephants. The delta region had the highest percentage (37.06 %) of elephants during the wet season while during the dry season, it had the second highest percentage (16.78 %) of elephants. The Pakuba region had the third highest percentage of elephants in both the wet and the dry seasons which were (27.01 %) and (12.63 %) respectively. Poaching and illegal ivory trade were the major key threats identified. The other key threats include the habitat degradation, predators and diseases, as well as elephant-human conflicts that led to death of two people in Koch-Goma area. From the present study it can be concluded that the elephant habitant is facing a rapid degradation from the human farming activities as well as the oil exploration activities which is making the elephants change their territories to unfavorable regions. The poaching activities have led to loss of precious wildlife resources through their illegal trade and harvesting. This creates the need for the MFNP authority to directly involve and sensitize the local community the relevance of having a national park and preserving it so as to stop the illegal harvesting of wildlife resources.