Examining the Roles and Attitudes of the Local Community in Wildlife Conservation of Ethiopia
Abstract
This short review summarizes the roles and behavioral responses of local communities towards wildlife conservation in Ethiopia. The inherent practices of local communities in their long-held traditional and cultural setups give them an important role in conservation successes. Traditional wildlife conservation practices in Ethiopia are not well documented and have likely been heavily eroded due to changes in governmental regimes, each with different ideologies, the introduction of modern lifestyles and religions, and ethnic and cultural diversities. Local communities contribute a lot to wildlife conservation when they are allowed to participate in fighting illegal wildlife trafficking operations. The illegal wildlife trade (IWT) in Ethiopia is still a comparatively new phenomenon with a low scientific profile. The roles of local people both in the IWT and in prevention and conservation efforts remain undocumented, and research into these is at an early stage. Several studies have indicated the alienation of the local community and their subsequent antagonistic responses towards conservation efforts in different parts of Ethiopia. Eviction of indigenous people, benefit denial, unequal benefit sharing, and interactions with wildlife and human-wildlife conflicts are the major factors fueling the resentment of local communities towards wildlife and their conservation. Thus, wildlife conservation in Ethiopia needs impartial studies and practical improvement to understand and address these human dimensions and inform more effective conservation and IWT prevention.
1. Introduction
Wildlife is central to the livelihoods of rural people across sub-Saharan Africa [1]. It serves as a major food source for millions of people and produces an important economic activity through ecotourism [2]. However, human activities have exposed many wildlife populations to considerable risks in the recent past [1]. The inability of wildlife to compete both for space and resources with alternative land uses due to rapid human population increase [3] is a major threat to wildlife conservation [4]. Many African countries have established protected areas (e.g., National Parks) without considering the local context and without any legal agreement with the local people [5]. Protected areas are chiefly monopolized and largely owned and governed by the state in the continent with few exceptions [4, 6, 7]. Bakarr [8] has recommended the need of reimagining the role of PAs in the continent.
The increased commercial use of natural resources from protected areas, however, has escalated the threats to wildlife in all sub-Saharan African countries due to human-wildlife conflicts [1, 9, 10]. This revealed the urgent need in the shift of conservation strategies in the region to people centered approach, where the local communities were directly involved and benefitted from the conservation activities in their surrounding [8]. As a result, conservation concepts and approaches recently moved towards participatory management programs [1, 11]. Community-based conservation practices were first introduced into African countries in the past three decades [1, 12] though its effectiveness is well questioned [13]. Guassa-Menz community conservation area exemplifies the introduction of such community systems in Ethiopia [14], but conservation strategy in Ethiopia still largely follows protectionism and conventional methods [7, 15].
Wildlife conservation policy of Ethiopia follows wildlife-first philosophy and the gun and guard conservation approach [7]. The country has established several protected areas in the communist Derg regime (1974–1991) as well as the succeeding regimes to protect the declining wildlife resources [6]. Wildlife populations in the country, however, are still under continuous threat over the past several decades [16]. Wildlife conservation of Ethiopia is affected by the spatial competition between humans and wildlife, poor wildlife conservation policy, rapid demographic increases, and expansions of infrastructural development that do not consider biodiversity issues [7, 17]. The scale of these threats partly increased because the human dimensions of the conservation areas in the country are not yet well recognized [18]. Fences and the gun conservation approach in particular have resulted uncompromised difference in the behavior and desire of the local communities and the conservationists [19]. The variations in conservation knowledge [18], benefits and costs sharing [7], and the prohibition of local community resources access are endangering the wildlife resources of the country [6, 7].
A recent study has revealed that local communities still view protected areas as a burden imposed on them by the state and unhappy with the practices [20]. Thus, conflicts between local communities and wildlife in and around protected areas are common episodes [20–22]. There is a paradigm shift in wildlife conservation approach of Ethiopia with regimes changes, but exclusionary conservation policy is not completely changed [23]. That is why there is a call for more inclusive and participatory wildlife conservation actions in the country [7, 16, 17, 24, 25]. Scholars also recommended the need to understand the local views of wildlife conservation and an improvement in local community involvement in the sector [16, 24–26].
There are plenty of published articles on the need for wildlife conservation, human-wildlife interactions, and the attitudes of the local community towards wildlife conservation in different localities of Ethiopia [7, 18, 21, 27]. Unexpectedly, they are still not compiled into an organized form. Hence, this short review intended to summarize these literatures and make them readily available in organized form. It also aimed to raise the level of attention on the roles and attitudes of local community towards wildlife conservation in the country.
2. Methods
A comprehensive search was conducted to generate scientific literatures on the interactions of local community and wildlife conservation. The search process focused on published articles, reports, and conference and discussion papers to document the human dimensions of wildlife conservation in Ethiopia. Google Scholar, Web of Science, ScienceDirect, Scopus, and Google Search engine databases were used to collect studies.
The search strategy employed the following keywords and phrases: “wildlife conservation” AND “local community,” “wildlife conservation” AND “livelihoods,” and “wildlife conservation” AND “education programs.” The key phrases were first searched without any geographic restriction followed by more specific searches for Africa and Ethiopia. The content of articles obtained by the search processes were examined and screened based on their relevance to the study concept and area. After excluding duplicates and unrelated articles, 92 articles fitted the inclusion criteria and selected for reviewing. There were no timeframe parameters and restrictions in the search processes. However, the articles that fitted the inclusion criteria and reviewed were published after 2000s with an exception.
The reviewing process consisted of a detail analysis of the contents and concepts of the reviewed articles. The contents and ideas of the analyzed articles were organized into possible themes. Finally, the reviewing process yielded four themes—the roles of local community in wildlife conservation, the attitudes of local community towards wildlife conservation, local livelihoods, and conservation education programs in wildlife conservation. These themes were selected as key topics or areas under which the main findings of the selected articles were summarized and presented. The level of significance of the generated information to the study concept and area was also considered as either critical if they were conducted in Ethiopia and provided information on human dimensions of wildlife conservation or supportive if they were carried out outside the country and provided complementary evidences. Furthermore, some key topics were divided into subtopics based on the generated information to have a detailed understanding on the topic.
3. Results and Discussion
The reviewed literatures (n = 92) provided information at least on one of the core concepts—the roles of local community in wildlife conservation, the attitudes of local community towards wildlife conservation, local livelihoods, and conservation education programs in wildlife conservation of Ethiopia. In addition, some articles were related to more than one key topic and provided information accordingly (Table 1); more than 40 of the reviewed literatures were studies conducted in Ethiopia and provided critical information on human dimensions of wildlife conservation in the country. The remaining literatures were the studies carried out in other Africa countries and elsewhere in the world and provided supportive evidences to wildlife conservation of Ethiopia.
| Key topics | Reviewed articles | Study areas | Subtopics covered | Significance of the information |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Roles of local community | 34 |
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| Local community attitudes | 41 |
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Factors affecting community attitudes |
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| Local livelihoods | 18 |
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| Conservation education | 10 |
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3.1. Roles of Local Community in Wildlife Conservation
Local people managed natural resources and their environment for millennia even before the introduction of modern forms of natural resource conservation and management [28]. African traditional societies worked locally well informed and complex religious and cultural belief systems to conserve and manage certain natural resources in their vicinity [9]. This precolonial system of sustainable management and utilization of wildlife by indigenous people dissociated during the colonial era [29]. The advent of western technology, the growing influence of foreign religion and beliefs, lack of modern regulations to enforce the traditional rules, and problems of migration, urbanization, and resettlement also played key roles for nonadherence to such belief systems [29].
The support of the local communities is vital for any conservation strategy success because the local people interact with wildlife on a daily basis and also bear the costs of conservation [30]. Frequent confrontations between the villagers and park authorities are reported when modern wildlife conservation techniques do not take the beliefs and taboos of local communities into consideration [31].
Community-based conservation approach, introduced to African continent in the past three decades to recognize the role of local communities, reduces the management cost by involving local people in the process and also protects the biodiversity and other natural resources [1, 32]. This is a holistic approach for the development that includes maintenance of sociocultural practices, community development, promotion of indigenous knowledge, development of ownership feeling, and responsibility at individual, community, and government levels [11]. It is considered as the best way of achieving sustainable development in the developing countries than the conventional conservation approach [1].
Modern conservation approaches in Ethiopia still poorly understand the holistic views and the close association of the local society [33]. The concept of protectionism still forms wildlife conservation methods in the country, and very little effort has been made to involve local people in wildlife management [6, 7, 15, 19]. The local people have no say in the decision makings and the management of the wildlife [6]. The excitement of the members of local communities after they visited Mago National Park that they had no prior experience witnesses this phenomenon [15]. The alienation of the local people may result conservation inefficiency, resentment by local people, and the subsequent deterioration of the very resources slated for protection [19].
Persistent retaliations and killings of wild animals by local people from different conservation areas of the country and the decline of wildlife in the country are cumulative outcomes of continued strict and state ownership conservation policies [7]. That is why several scholars recommended the recognition of human dimensions and decentralization of wildlife conservation of the country [16, 17].
Ethiopia is a multiethnic country with numerous cultural and traditional belief systems across these ethnic lines. The role of these traditional belief systems in wildlife conservation, however, is poorly investigated and documented. This is probably due to the unwavering efforts of past regimes to create a culturally homogenous society and a centralized conservation approaches exercised by the country.
3.1.1. Roles of Traditional Belief Systems and Practices
Local norms and customs shape people’s everyday forms of resource use [1]. Almost all African societies have a longstanding historical association with wildlife and traditional and cultural attachments to certain wild animals [30]. The behavior of the community towards wildlife is influenced by various cultural beliefs, taboos, and respect for sacred sanctuaries [34]. They have conserved wildlife in their environment since time immemorial by refraining themselves as well as the outsiders from the use of wildlife through traditional management and mystic forces [29]. Community participation with their traditional knowledge, system, and practices should, therefore, be the starting point in any wildlife conservation and management [11].
Traditional belief systems locally play a major role in wildlife conservation and management because local communities have an interest in these belief systems [31]. The role of traditional beliefs in the protection of natural resources is reflected in a variety of practices [28]. The use of taboos and totems is one of the recent strategies employed to ensure sustainable use of wildlife resources [29]. Taboos and totems are rooted in human life since human creation, when God prohibited Adam and Eve from touching and eating the tree of life in the Holy Bible (Genesis 2: 16-17). This strategy, however, received minimal recognition within official conservation policies in the colonial conservation systems and thereafter [30].
Social taboos are unwritten social rules that define the human behavior of wildlife exploitation [28, 31]. They are declared as sacred and forbidden by people [29]. Wildlife-use taboos vary within the ethnic group, clan, gender, age, physiological condition, or health status [34]. Important taboos that favor sustainable wildlife management includes hunting prohibitions in secret places and specific day and prohibitions to kill totems and deterring women from hunting [31]. Nishizaki [15] reported that women are prohibited from hunting in southwestern Ethiopia.
Nishizaki [15] also documented the organization of Ari society around Mago National Park into a traditional Chiefdom headed by ritual kings called Baabi during the Derg regime. The Baabi set the rule of hunting such as limiting the numbers, the sex, and species of animals for the hunters. Menz area grasslands were also conserved by traditional resource management system known as Qero [14]. Some tabooed species that are only used for ceremonial purposes and are believed to enable connection with the ancestors are highly protected [31]. Thus, such belief systems have high potential to promote sustainability and help to protect rare species.
Local communities also know in which time the harvest pose a negative effect on the future of the resources and avoid utilizing them to ensure sustainable utilization [34]. The continuity of the respect to taboos is largely affected due to the decrease of alternative resources or influence of outsiders [34]. Hundera [33] reported similar trends in Jimma areas of Ethiopia, where the outsiders exploit the resources that the local people culturally respect. Teferra and Beyene [7] observed the vital role played by elders or customary authorities in controlling overuse of grazing resources inside the Abjiata Shala Lakes National Park. They also noted the effectiveness of this mechanism compared to the centralized and strict management practices.
Totem refers to organisms that are revered by group of people as holy sacred [29, 34]. They are considered as an emblem consisting of an object such as an animal or plant that serves as the symbol of a family or clan [30]. Certain communities highly respect and protect certain animal species because they believe that the spirits of their ancestors reside in this animal species and the animals represent their emblem or totem [34]. These communities cannot kill this species unless in case of self-defense, for cultural sacrament or against attack to livestock [30]. The communities believe that these mystic forces to have an important role in regulating resources and protecting community members [34]. Although traditional societies have a strong cultural appreciation for some animals, structures to transfer this appreciation into wildlife management are still missing [31]. In case of Ethiopia, it is yet to be studied or, otherwise, it is completely eroded.
Sacred natural sites are the world’s oldest form of habitat protection [35]. As traditional societies believe that mystic forces reside in sacred sanctuaries, they enter these places only for ritual ceremonies [36]. Traditionally, the local people and their neighbors do not harvest and utilize wildlife and wildlife products from such places [34]. A person who violates these rules will be punished mostly in kind, but if he is unable to do that the punishment will be converted into cash [31, 33].
The Ethiopian Orthodox Tewahido Churches have conserved patches of native trees around church buildings as sacred sanctuaries for church communities for centuries [36]. In addition to their intended religious and cultural values, sacred natural sites have also a profound impact on attitudes to protection of the natural world [35]. This restriction is believed to have contributed to the protection of wildlife located therein and to have made these places to serve as refuge to threatened wild species [30]. Aeraya et al. [37] have reported rich avifaunal diversity in such forest areas.
In spite of the prominent roles played by the traditional belief systems in conservation of biodiversity and the environment, they are not given the recognition they deserve both in theory and practice [31]. A study conducted by Hundera [33] in Jimma zone suggested that the traditional management systems of natural resources are currently almost eroded. The alternating changes in regimes with different ideologies are reported to be the driving forces for the decline and abandonment of traditional belief systems in Ethiopia [14, 15].
Like elsewhere in Africa, migration and the introduction of modern religions and modernization into the traditional societies are also responsible for the decline of traditional and cultural practices in wildlife conservation in Ethiopia [15, 33, 38]. The success of traditional systems of resource conservation also relies heavily on the presence of a homogenous ethnic or cultural community sharing similar values and experiences [31]. Ethiopia is a country with heterogeneous cultural and ethnic setup. This cultural and ethnic heterogeneity may also contribute to the erosion of cultural and traditional beliefs in the modern Ethiopian society.
3.1.2. Roles of Local Community in Illegal Wildlife Trade
Illicit wildlife trafficking is an environmental crime that involves the illegal trade of endangered and protected wildlife as well as their products [39]. The scale of wildlife trafficking is extremely high but poorly documented [3]. It became a topic of international attention and concern over recent years [40]. Now, it is the third largest illegal activity in the world, after weapons and drugs trafficking [41, 42]. It continues to threaten wildlife species, including endangered species [3].
According to Price [43], a failure to enforce rights over wildlife resources is mainly responsible for IWT. The cultural, traditional, or customary value of some of the goods trafficked has also contributed to the persistence of the problem [39]. International trade in wildlife and their derivatives has considerable impact on overexploitation and habitat destruction [3]. It threatens conservation efforts of rare and endangered species, affects the economy of the source country, transmits serious diseases into native animals and local people, causes damage to the ecological interactions and genetic heritage, and serves as a source of funds for terrorists and other forms of organized crimes, thereby threatens national and global security [39, 42–45].
Most wild animals are trafficked from developing countries to the developed world [41]. Illegal trade in wildlife and their byproducts has become a problem in African wildlife conservation in the 20th century and has been on the rise in recent years [43]. The scale and scope of wildlife trafficking in the continent continues to grow at an alarming rate, reversing decades of conservation gains [46, 47]. Poaching and trafficking of ivory and rhino horns are the two devastating wildlife crimes in Africa [42, 46]. Nowadays, populations of these two endangered iconic species are severely affected and in rapid decline [48].
The main economic drivers of IWT in the region include poverty in source countries, lack of alternative livelihoods and subsistence in source countries, cultural and colonial legacies in sub-Saharan Africa, and the increasing demand in consumer countries [43]. Law enforcement and measures focused on communities and sustainable livelihoods are the two major areas proposed to address IWT in source countries [49].
Local communities have a key role in the reduction of the wildlife trafficking crisis [44] because they always live in close proximity to these animals, and they are better equipped with certain knowledge about their environment [48]. They can easily expose individuals engaged in such activities but concealed from the state and private interventions enforcers and defend the animals from the traffickers when they encounter it [49]. However, local community level interventions to reduce IWT have attracted far less consideration in certain places [49]. This complicates any illegal trafficking counter efforts by encouraging the local community support and complicity either as recruits or ignorant of the activities [44]. The communities actively participate and become committed in the intervention processes when they are encouraged by increased benefits from conservation [49]. Combating IWT is also an important step for the local communities to develop their livelihoods and connect themselves to conservation [43].
IWT in Ethiopia is still a relatively new phenomenon, dating back only about four decades [50]. Mwebaza et al.’s [50] work is perhaps the first-ever publication that covered the nature and extent of environmental crimes in the country. These scholars placed illegal trafficking of wildlife products as the second major cause of wildlife loss in Ethiopia, next to habitat destruction. Recent works in northern and southern Ethiopia border checkpoints can provide optimism and shows a sign of publications resurgence on the matter [45, 51–54].
More than reflecting on the current status of illicit wildlife trafficking, these scientific works play invaluable role in the understanding of the crime in the country. They can also be considered as a milestone work in the history of environmental crimes of the country because they are the work of native scholars and became available in numbers for the first time. Mulualem et al. [45] have reported an intense commercial trafficking of animal genetic resources from the western Tigray to the adjacent neighboring states. This team of scholars also tried to figure out the causes, smuggling mechanisms, and factors that exacerbated the smuggling activities of wildlife resources in the area.
The same scholars also published three more articles on the attitudes and knowledge of custom agents, institutional capacity, and the social network interfaces of illegal animal genetic resource trafficking in border checkpoints [52–54]. The findings of these studies have provided adequate evidences on the prevalence of IWT in the country and opened a new chapter for the need of further investigation on various aspects of illegal wildlife trafficking in different parts of the country. It is thereafter that the local communities described poaching as the main threats to wildlife conservation in Alledeghi Wildlife Reserve of Eastern Ethiopia [55]. Even though the exploration of IWT in Ethiopia is in its initial stage, the roles of the local people in the smuggling as well as in its control systems remain as a subject for future studies.
3.2. Community Attitudes towards Wildlife Conservation
The inter-relationship between wild animals and human can be analyzed by the attitudinal behavior shown by one against the other [56]. Attitudinal studies are tools for evaluating public understanding, acceptance, and the impact of conservation interventions as well as the fate of conservation [57, 58]. Effective wildlife conservation requires the understanding of the need of the targeted species as well as the human dimensions of the conservation practices because wild animals are lost or conserved locally [59, 60].
Local communities’ perceptions and attitudes and knowledge have invaluable role in identifying and devising management programs and strategies that integrate local development that best fit for the protection of particular wildlife [25, 57]. It is also important to solve human-wildlife-related problems and conflicts [60]. Thus, recognizing the local people perspectives in conservation ensures the success of conservation activities.
3.2.1. Factors Affecting Community Attitudes towards Conservation
Attitudes and perceptions of local communities towards wildlife vary considerably from place to place and from one protected area to another [61]. This spatial variation is heavily based on the benefits gained and the costs incurred by the local society from wildlife and its conservation measures [25, 57, 62]. The local communities develop positive attitudes towards wildlife conservation through infrastructure construction, harvesting of wildlife products, job opportunity, and by earning of foreign exchange from tourists and other conservation practitioners [9, 25]. Several studies reported positive attitudes of local people towards wild animals and their conservation in Ethiopia [18, 25, 26, 59].
Local people develop negative attitudes towards wildlife conservation when they sustain costs from wildlife and their conservation measures [57, 62]. Some of the factors that trigger negative attitudes in the society towards wildlife conservation include land displacement without adequate compensation, lack of involvement in conservation activities, and lack of any direct benefits from conservation practices [9]. Numerous studies have also recorded antagonistic behaviors of the local people towards wild animals from most parts of Ethiopia [18, 22, 63]. Such antagonistic behaviors are triggered from the lack of involvement of the local people in the conservation arena, decision making, unequal sharing of wildlife-related benefits and costs, and in adequacy of public awareness on the matter [7, 18, 63].
(1) Displacements of Local People. Areas that are designated as wildlife conservation areas were once occupied by the local people who were expelled from these areas for conservation purposes [64, 65]. African countries are the front runners in expelling local people from wildlife conservation areas. More specifically, there are four documented cases of local people evictions for conservation motives are in the major national parks of the Ethiopia-Semien Mountains National Park, Nechisar National Park, Omo National Park, and Awash National Park [6, 19, 64, 66]. Suddenly, only local people evicted from Semien Mountains National Park are able to return back to their original lands [19].
The costs of evictions vary among the local communities as some groups are more likely to experience the costs of evictions than the others [32]. Only very few studies mentioned compensation for local people displacement either through land or money. Those studies that mentioned compensations tend to provide inadequate or absent compensation examples [64]. Displacing the local people from their lands without comprehensive studies and suitable compensations incur costs on both the local people and the conservation programs. This is mainly because of the fact that people that are eviction develop negative attitudes and resentment to the wildlife conservation than cooperating conservation programs [64]. According to Krueger [67], handling displacement in more impartial ways contribute to the fair distribution of costs and benefits of wildlife conservation on the local people.
Displacement impacts the livelihoods of the local community through landlessness, joblessness, homelessness, marginalization, food insecurity, increased morbidity, inability of access to common property, and mortality and social disarticulation [64, 68]. So, it is highly recommendable that conservation programs had better to create a partnership with the local people than forcing them out of the conservation areas.
(2) Benefits Denial. Indigenous people develop a negative attitude and resentments towards wildlife conservation and the instituted system of wildlife management when they are denied various economic, social, and cultural benefits from conservation activities [6, 62]. Direct benefits that the local people gain from wildlife conservation of Ethiopia are also negligible because financial benefits are directed to the state like some African countries [1, 4, 7]. Majority of the local people in and around the Abjiata National Park, for example, are unhappy with the national park because they assume that the park took away their communal pasture areas [63]. Teferra and Beyene [7] also reported the desire of the same local people to reclaim the park areas either for grazing or farming purposes.
Punishments of the local people by the sanctuary staff when they are found killing or injuring the wild animals also made the local people anxious and attack the wild animals in Senkelle Hartebeest Sanctuary [6]. Various scientific reports also noted the role of the delivery of promised benefits by protected areas management in shaping the attitudes of local communities towards wildlife conservation [6, 27]. Unfair exclusion of local community from conservation costs not only the society but also the conservation programs and project because it results widespread and uncontrolled poaching that threaten sustainability of wildlife resources [9].
Local communities adjacent to conservation areas should be considered as important stakeholders to strengthen their support for conservation than conservation risks [69]. There is also an experience from Botswana where settlements are on a defined land size, gathering of some plants and tree products that are important for subsistence and household, and small-scale livestock rearing are legally permitted for the local communities that were in wildlife management areas [70].
3.2.2. Unequal Benefits Sharing and Level of Interactions with Wildlife
There is a potential imbalance in the gains and losses among those thought to be beneficial from wildlife conservation [32]. Unequal benefits sharing among the local people results varying attitudes towards wildlife conservation, where those obtain benefits develop positive and the others develop hostile behaviors to the conservation [11, 71]. For example, majority of the local community who had access to bush meat from protected areas in Kenya developed positive attitude towards wildlife conservation than those who did not receive it [9]. Hence, equitably shared benefits reduce the wildlife threats emerging from the local people [71].
Local communities’ attitudes and perceptions towards wildlife conservation vary within the same community based on the level of their interactions with wildlife [18]. Local people who do not have land inside or adjoining to the protected area, developed positive attitudes for its existence, but those who have land inside or adjoining to the protected area developed negative attitudes towards wildlife conservation [18, 26]. Community attitude towards wildlife conservation may also vary by sociodemographic factors such as gender, residency, age, education level, and household size [57, 59, 61, 72].
3.2.3. Human-Wildlife Conflicts
Human-wildlife conflicts can also shape the attitude of the local community [9, 62]. According to Ochieng et al. [62], the attitudes of local community towards wildlife conservation is influenced by their source of livelihood—households that were dependent on livestock keeping or agriculture less likely support wildlife conservation. Crop raiding can reduce tolerance towards the species that are already threatened, and potential dangers posed by conflicts with large-bodied animals may also negatively influence local attitudes on conservation [62, 73]. For example, in a study conducted by Larson et al. [72], most local people believed that wild animals that cause crop damage should be killed.
The local communities from various protected areas of Ethiopia also viewed the existence of crop raiding and livestock depredating wild animals in their area as problematic [20, 22, 24, 74]. For example, Arssi Oromo people living around Senkelle Hartebeest Sanctuary have resisted conservation practices due to crop raiding and livestock attacks by wild animals [6].
The antagonistic behavior that local society may develop towards wild animals range from local frustration [75] to retaliation [76] and killing of these animals [6, 20]. Local communities employ several traditional management practices to reduce the risks of crop raiding and livestock depredation [24, 77, 78]. Other costs that could shape the attitudes of local communities towards wildlife conservation include missing from school, work, social events, and sleep to guard crop and livestock from wildlife-related damages [74, 79]. Compensation for the lost resources by the conservation authority reduces the hostility between wildlife and local people [2].
3.3. Wildlife Conservation and Local Livelihoods
Local communities adjacent to conservation areas depend on natural resources of PAs for their livelihoods and employ several livelihood strategies [14, 80–83]. The household economy of most local communities around wildlife conservation areas in Ethiopia mainly depends on agricultural and livestock production [14, 63, 84, 85]. Households may also depend on the natural environment for livelihoods through livestock grazing area, collection of forest products such as charcoal, firewood, and building materials, and grasses for thatching and animal fodders [24, 25, 84, 85].
Wildlife conservation may generate either positive or negative effects to the local communities [74, 82–84, 86]. The positive impacts include direct revenue from environmental protection, diversification of income sources through ecotourism, and the maintenance of ecosystem services such as watershed protection [14, 82, 84]. Ecotourism is a holistic conservation approach that incorporates conservation of protected areas and improvement of the livelihoods of communities [82].
Ecotourism is an important industry that creates employment opportunity for the local communities and a greater partnership for sustainable management of conservation areas [87]. Local communities can generate income from tourist service deliveries viz. mule and horse renting, hand craft selling, tourist guiding, and providing food and beverages for tourists and from nontourist activities such as grass selling [25, 69, 82].
A considerable proportion of the households in Abune Yosef and Guassa conservation areas financially benefit from ecotourism, leading local people to consider natural resources protection positively [14, 84]. Profits of local community from Guassa community conservation area have inspired replication efforts from other conservation areas in the region [14]. Local communities in eastern Ethiopia also felt that they are positively impacted by the existence of wildlife reserve in their surroundings. They believed that their livelihoods have been improved through direct consumption, job opportunity, social services, and establishment of ecotourism association like camel riding association that created alternative income generation [55]. These are some evidences that tourism can be an important alternative income source when developed as a community-based initiative [14, 55, 84]. Therefore, prohibiting the local people from these livelihood strategies brings significant impacts on their household economy [80]. The growth of ecotourism can also help to address human-wildlife conflict [71].
The negative impacts of conservation efforts to the local people include crop damage [81], livestock predation [21, 78], loss of human lives [81], and restriction of settlement, expansion of farming, livestock grazing, and collecting firewood and thatched grass [63, 74, 82, 83]. There is a spatial variation in the nature and magnitude of these problems in Ethiopia [63]. These problems highly affect the livelihood and farmers ability to feed his or her family [81]. There is the case when wild animals significantly contributed to the shortage of food and the poverty of the society as a result of crop raiding [86]. This is particularly very challenging for smallholder farmers’ livelihoods [74].
Conservation programs in Ethiopia need drastic improvement to improve local livelihoods and achieve wildlife conservation goals. This suggests a need to better integrate the livelihood needs of local people with conservation activities mainly by devising ecofriendly strategies and biodiversity stewardship via payments for ecosystem services schemes [58, 84, 86]. Provision of alternative livelihood opportunities and creating a context-based conservation scheme along with continuous conservation education could also help to reduce the negative effects of wildlife conservation on the local people [81].
3.4. Conservation Education Programs
Conservation education is one of the most important tools for combating conservation problems because it motivates the general public about conservation practices [88]. Education helps to improve the attitude and behavior of the society positively by increasing their familiarity and awareness levels on the importance of wildlife and their conservation [81, 89]. Educated and young people are more supportive for sustainable development efforts than other ones [63, 88].
Conservation education can be gained via formal and/or informal education programs [81, 89, 90]. Both formal and informal education programs such as conservation awareness, educational tours, workshops and training, and conservation education in schools enable the local human resources to contribute to conservation efforts [11]. The introduction of conservation education in schools has far-fetching impacts on wildlife conservation [91]. Consequently, many countries including Ethiopia adopted environmental education in their formal education system starting from lower grades up to higher education institutions [88]. Some universities, Arbaminch University in particular, are also developing and teaching environmentally oriented education curriculum in their postgraduate program [92]. This greatly contributes in improving the attitudes of community towards wildlife and their conservation [81].
Most conservation studies in Ethiopia recommended education programs for local communities bordering PAs [81, 89]. However, there are limited documented practical experiences due to either rare implementations or poor documentation. According to Mamo et al. [55], the provision of conservation education for the local communities around Allegdi wildlife reserve helped the society to gain knowledge and skills on wildlife conservation and their livelihood improvement. Some of Menz community members around Guassa community conservation area also gained conservation training to serve as tour guides and produce artisanal handicrafts for sale to visiting tourists [14].
Another informal conservation education program was provided to local resource persons in western Ethiopia [90]. The success story of this conservation education is a dramatic decline of poaching and wildlife shooting in the area after educating local resource persons. The only identified challenge to this program was the reluctance of government structures to cooperate. Such practices should be adopted in other areas of the country that are identified as important for conservation purposes.
4. Future Directions on Wildlife Conservation of Ethiopia
Several anthropogenic factors severely threatened the protected areas and wildlife of Ethiopia [16, 20, 68]. Failures to recognize the human perspectives of wildlife conservation in the country exacerbated the scale of these threats [16, 17]. Wildlife conservation knowledge of local communities also showed a significant difference in space [18, 22, 63]. Understanding the attitudes of local communities towards wildlife conservation determines the future of conservation programs and is fundamental to design appropriate policies and conservation plans [58]. A study conducted around the Gibe Sheleko National Park has showed that the provision of adequate awareness for the local people in religious places created positive attitudes in the local community for conservation actions [18]. This suggests the need of such trends to enhance the wildlife conservation knowledge of the local communities.
There should be also the mainstreaming of ideas and concepts about wildlife conservation to all the stakeholders and additional and adequate trainings for capacity building to enhance the knowledge levels of these actors on wildlife conservation and existence values [17, 63]. Education programs such as in schools, educational tours, workshops and training, and conservation awareness enabled the local people contribution to the conservation efforts [11].
Several studies have identified that community-based conservation in Ethiopia is in infant stage and incompletely cascaded to the stakeholders. As a result, there is low level of local people participations in wildlife conservation of the country [6, 15–17, 19]. According to Legese [68], these problems should be addressed and solved in order to ensure the successes of wildlife conservation of Ethiopia.
The attitudes and perceptions of the local society towards wildlife conservation in Ethiopia are positively shaped by denial of local communities from accessing wildlife and wildlife products [7]. The spirit of ownership of the resources among the local people can be ensured through installing fair and equitable sharing of wildlife resources and other profits for the local communities. The benefits that the local communities gain from wildlife conservation can be improved via an increased involvement in decision makings and employment opportunities, revenue sharing, infrastructural developments, and ecotourism.
Local communities’ traditional taboos and belief systems on wildlife use have been the latest pillars of sustainable wildlife conservation across Africa [29–31]. However, there is only limited information on these practices in Ethiopia. Identifying and recognizing such traditional customary laws in numerous traditional societies and integrating them with modern conservation practices are highly appealing.
In Ethiopia, the involvement of local people in IWT and its intervention processes are still unexplored areas. The exploration of illicit wildlife trafficking activities, its networks, and management measures to tackle the immediate consequences of this crime in the country should also be a high priority area. Recognizing the local people in the intervention processes of the wildlife crime has also huge contribution to the success of its control measures.
5. Conclusion
The role of local community in wildlife conservation of Ethiopia is not well studied and is an unrecognized area that needs detailed studies to understand the clear relationship between local people and conservation activities. As long as this area is not clearly understood and appropriately addressed, the success of wildlife conservation in the country is in jeopardy. Due to the difference of costs and benefits among the local communities, there is also variation in behavioral responses of local people towards wildlife conservation in different parts of Ethiopia. Site specific studies are, therefore, needed to devise effective conservation measures for all conservation areas.
Conflicts of Interest
The author declares that there are no conflicts of interest.
Open Research
Data Availability
Data used for this article are fully presented in the paper.
