The School for Field Studies
Center for Wildlife Management Studies

Kenya Center Awarded U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service Grant to Conduct Elephant Research

September 2007

Kimana, Kenya – The School for Field Studies-Center for Wildlife Management Studies (SFS-CWMS) in Kimana, Kenya has been awarded a grant in the amount of $52,009 from the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (USFWS) African Elephant Conservation Fund. This grant will fund a year-long project entitled An Integrated Approach to Managing Elephants: Land Use Changes and Local Community Awareness in the Amboseli Ecosystem.

The Amboseli ecosystem, an 8,000 km2 area defined by the movement of elephant populations living within Amboseli National Park, has recently undergone changes that threaten the survival of this population. Changes in land-uses have resulted in increasing contraction and fragmentation of elephant habitat. This ecosystem fragmentation not only affects wildlife but also threatens the future of wildlife tourism, a main source of income for the government and the local people in the area. The goal of this project is to establish a cooperative effort among local land owners and other stakeholders to safeguard the future of elephants in the Amboseli ecosystem. SFS-CWMS will create an integrated land-use plan for the area and will institute outreach programs to educate local landowners, residents, and youth on sustainable land-use management and elephant conservation.

The project will begin with the collection of the data necessary to develop integrated land-use plans for Kimana, Kuku, and Mbirikani Group Ranches, which will then be used to enhance a participatory community education process to develop mechanisms that ensure the land is used compatibly with elephant conservation. The specific objectives of the project are 1) determine the impact of human activity on the elephant range in the three group ranches between Amboseli, Tsavo West, and Chyulu Hills National Parks; 2) assess local community stakeholders' attitudes toward elephant conservation on the group ranches; 3) develop a strategic land-use plan for Kuku, Kimana, and Mbirikani Group Ranches that considers elephant use of all three ranches; and 4) design and implement elephant conservation awareness programs for primary and secondary school youth, Maasai morans, women's groups, and Conflict Resolution Committees.  

This project forms part of a wide consultative process among the foremost stakeholders in wildlife conservation in the greater Amboseli ecosystem—Kenya Wildlife Service, African Elephant Research Project, African Conservation Center, and the Amboseli Tsavo Group Ranch Association.

SFS-CWMS has been working in the Amboseli region since 1999, seeking ways to mitigate human-wildlife conflict in the area and thus maintain biological diversity, ecological integrity, and ultimately the local economic stability of the ecosystem.

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