GAME MANAGEMENT AREAS (GMA)

 Game management is a term that refers to the management of wildlife in the hunting context. The purpose of this type of management is to optimise the production of game on a territory in order to ensure the sustainable exploitation of game without disrupting the farming-forestry-hunting balance.

Using different actions, this type of management supports the development of game populations, while avoiding overpopulation phenomena which could damage farming and forestry activities, or safety (road accidents, avian flu).

Foundations of Game Management

Game management is based on:

·         actions to create, maintain and restore natural habitats for game and wildlife to support the reproduction of species and prevent game from venturing out onto roads, into fields, or into cities;

·         reasonable hunting of individuals depending on population numbers and individual characteristics (sex, age, state of health);

·         feeding, implementation of game ranching and salt licks;

·         introduction or reintroduction of individuals and species to repopulate an environment or consolidate a population;

·         creation of game and wildlife reserves to support the reproduction and tranquillity of wildlife.

Game Management Areas (GMAs) are areas surrounding National Parks. They serve as buffer zones to national parks and are areas where both humans and animals are supposed to co-exist. In Zambia, GMAs have different landuse and the major forms include wildlife conservation, hunting, agriculture, human settlement, forestry and mining. Normally, these forms of landuse have different requirements. The GMAs are generally inhabited by poor people and human population is generally increasing requiring land and technologies capable of meeting their needs such as wood-fuel, food, and shelter. 

The poverty levels experienced by poorest people in the GMA pose a threat to the environment as well as the welfare of the people. The need to reconcile the landuse conflicts and the needs of the people, therefore, becomes imperative. This can be done through formulation and implementation of an integrated land use plan. Land use planning in the GMAs entails finding economic and efficient ways of using land and other resources available in those areas.

Establishment of Game Management Areas in Zambia

Objectives of Establishing GMAs in Zambia were to create buffer zones for National Parks in order to reduce or eliminate human encroachment into National Parks. They were also established in order to provide for a technically controlled and sustained curling scheme of animals through safari hunting. Safari hunting was to provide resource and revenue to promote conservation and community development project in the GMAs. This then, would provide the community with social infrastructure, which could not otherwise be available through normal channels.

Zambia has a particularly vast wildlife estate, which encompasses 20 national parks (~64,000 km²) and 36 Game Management Areas (167,000 km²) and a variety of other protected area categories, which together comprise 40% of the nation's land area (Government of Zambia, 2010). Zambia’s national parks and Controlled Hunting Areas (CHAs) were reorganized into national parks and GMAs in 1972 when the National Parks and Wildlife Act of 1968 came into force. 

Subsequently the National Parks and Wildlife Act of 1991 replaced the 1968 version and in turn it was replaced by the Zambia Wildlife Act of 1998. There were no substantial changes in the subsequent Acts in terms of national parks. The national parks are almost exclusively reserved for conservation and enhancement of wildlife, ecosystem, biodiversity and natural beauty. All forms of land use in GMAs are subject to provisions of management plans developed by Community Resource Boards CRBs (Zambia Wildlife Act, 1998, Section 7).

The community-based natural resource management (CBNRM) program in Zambia evolved out of the Administrative Management Design (ADMADE) program financed by USAID in the 1990s. By 1997 the current community institutional structures were established. In this system, Village Action Groups (VAGs) are composed of five to ten elected representatives from a cluster of villages of populations of 500-1,000. Each VAG elects its representative to sit on the Community Resource Board (CRB). Each CRB consists of 9-10 members and elects a chairperson. An officer of ZAWA is assigned to the area under a CRB, as its unit leader.

The revenue stream to CRB originates from ZAWA and is called “Wildlife Conservation Revolving Funds (WCRF).” (ZAWA, 2007) Fifty percent of all ZAWA revenue is allocated to CRBs for community development out of which 5 percent goes directly to the chiefs. Each CRB may employ one or more local game scouts to assist ZAWA in enforcing anti-poaching regulations from the 45 percent allocation. CRBs enjoy wide latitude in deciding how the remaining WCRF is used.

The early days of the CBNRM program witnessed widespread misappropriation of funds. In light of such criticisms of the CBNRM program, this study seeks to differentiate between the poor and the non-poor households and measure differences in welfare gains between poor and non-poor households that may be attributable to residing in GMA and participating in CRB/VAG activities. Estimations of welfare impacts for the poor and non-poor allow us to measure the possibility and extent of elite capture of benefits derived from the GMA within the communities.

MAIN GAME MANAGEMENT AREAS IN ZAMBIA

Zambia has one of the largest protected areas in Southern Africa. Two types of wildlife areas exist: National Parks and the GMAs. These protected areas for wildlife cover a total of 23 million hectares, representing an estimated 30 percent of the country’s total area. The wildlife estate comprises 19 National Parks and 34 GMAs. National Parks cover 6.4. Million hectares, representing 8.4 percent of the total land area while GMAs cover 16.6 million hectares accounting for 22 percent of the total land area (GRZ, 1994). 

Zambia’s protected areas for wildlife date back to the colonial era. In the quest to protect wildlife, the British Colonial Administration introduced the Game Ordinance in 1925. The Game ordinance was the forerunner of the many other wildlife legislations that provided for the creation of game reserves, national parks and controlled hunting areas. The Game Management Declaration Order of 1971 provided for the creation of a new category of protected area, namely, the GMA, originally called Controlled Hunting Area during the colonial period. GMAs started as Controlled Hunting Areas in the fifties. 

The 1972 National Parks and Wildlife Act later declared them GMAs. This followed a realization that the existing Laws had precluded large areas of land to human habitation, in favour of game. This led to hostility and misuse of the national parks by villagers around them and those who had been evicted from the national parks and the GMAs. 

The Idea of human beings co-existing with wild game became pronounced with the introduction of GMAs, after all they have always lived together from time immemorial. It was also believed that rural dwellers in GMAs, if they appreciated the 13 value of wildlife, would look after it for future benefits. Controlled cropping would be used to generate tangible benefits to the communities in GMAs once done at sustainable levels, taking in account its value.

Game Management Areas in Zambia

Need to control wild life population in the GMA

In GMAs, the Wildlife Act provided for the establishment of Community Resource Boards (CRBs) as the institutions through which communities could work with ZAWA

CRBs co-manage wildlife in GMAs with ZAWA and receive a share of revenues from trophy hunting. From that income, CRBs are required to recruit village scouts to assist ZAWA with law enforcement. These village scouts are appointed by 'village action groups' (3-10 of which are developed per chiefdom), which fall under CRBs.

Wildlife-based land uses have significant potential to improve livelihoods for communities in GMAs (and similar Open Areas).