Wildlife of Botswana. A Photographic Guide, by Nikos G. Petrou and Neil MacLeod

Wildlife of Botswana. A Photographic Guide, by Nikos Petrou and Neil MacLeod. Penguin Random House South Africa. Imprint: Struik Nature. Cape Town, South Africa 2024. ISBN 9781775841098 / ISBN 978-1-77-584109-8

Wildlife of Botswana. A Photographic Guide, by Nikos G. Petrou and Neil MacLeod. Nature Conservation And Threats To Biodiversity.

Nikos G. Petrou  Neil MacLeod  

In Botswana, game and hunting management regulations first appeared in the early 1900s, whereas the establishment of protected areas began during the 1950s, peaking in the 1980s. National parks (NP), game reserves (GR) and forest reserves (FR) account almost 30% of the country's area, the highest percentage in Africa. These are: Chobe NP; Nxai Pan NP; Makgadikgadi NP; Central Kalahari GR; Moremi GR; Khutse GR; Manyelanong GR; Northern Tuli GR; Nnywane Dam GR; Mogobane Bird Sanctuary; Bathoen Dam Bird Sanctuary; Nata Bird Sanctuary; Maun Game Sanctuary; Chobe FR; Maikaelelo FR; Kazuma FR; Kasane FR; Kasane extension FR; and Sibuyu FR. An additional 20% of the country is also designated as Wildlife Management Areas (WMAs), which act as buffer zones between incompatible land uses, particularly livestock farming and wildlife, or as migration corridors. WMAs are often designated adjacent to national parks and game reserves to enable sustainable management of wildlife, usually through Community-based Natural Resource Management activities. Private protected areas add a further 2% and play an important role in wildlife conservation. The Okavango Delta is a Ramsar site and a UNESCO World Heritage Site. International conservation efforts are currently focusing on connecting adjoining protected areas in neighbouring countries to address issues of wildlife population growth beyond local carrying capacity, and to re-establish severed migration corridors. The Kgalagadi Transfrontier Park, a vast wilderness in the southern Kalahari, is the first such park created in Africa, in 1999, with 73% lying in Botswana and the remainder in South Africa; it is administered jointly by the two countries. On the Botswana side, it has incorporated the former Gemsbok National Park and the Mabuasehube Game Reserve. Botswana also participates in two other initiatives: one to create the Kavango-Zambezi Transfrontier Conservation Area (shared with Angola, Namibia, Zambia and Zimbabwe), which, when fully established, will be the world's largest conservation area; the second one to create the Greater Mapungubwe Transfrontier Conservation Area shared with South Africa and Zimbabwe, which was proclaimed in 2004. Even though visitors to Botswana will often have the impression of being in a near-pristine wilderness, the country's fragile ecosystems face varying degrees of environmental pressures, affecting biodiversity and ecosystem services. Among them, the major threats are land degradation and habitat destruction, unsustainable water use and pollution, and climate change. Land degradation exerts a strong impact, especially in the northern and eastern parts of the country, where most farming occurs. The main drivers are: the growing human population; unregulated grazing by cattle and goats, resulting in changing vegetation communities; bushfires; wind erosion; tree felling and fuelwood collection, which result in significant depletion around settlements; inappropriate farming techniques; inadequate management of waste around rural areas; and mining activities. [...] Since the 1980s, tourism policies have recognised that the country lacked the human and system resources to manage the rapidly growing visitor numbers and would not be able to protect its wildlife and maintain an exclusive, quality product. Thus, an environmentally friendly tourism model of 'high revenue, low volume' was adopted, which has spread beyond the protected areas to most of the country. Wildlife tourism is now the second most important income generator, supporting conservation and stimulating sustainable economic development in remote and rural areas. Currently, conservation efforts are guided by the National Biodiversity Strategy and Action Plan, first submitted in 2004 and revised in 2007 and 2016, as well as by the requirements of international conventions to which Botswana is a signatory. [...]

This is an excerpt from Wildlife of Botswana. A Photographic Guide, by Nikos Petrou and Neil MacLeod.

Title: Wildlife of Botswana
Subtitle: A Photographic Guide
Author: Nikos G. Petrou; Neil MacLeod
Publisher: Penguin Random House South Africa
Imprint: Struik Nature
Cape Town, South Africa 2024
ISBN 9781775841098 / ISBN 978-1-77-584109-8
Softcover, 15 x 21 cm, 160 pages, throughout colour photos, 1 maps