Efforts by the New Sudan Wildlife Conservation Organization (NSWCO)
and Wildlife and Livestock Working Group of the Sudan Transitional Assistance
for Rehabilitation/ Somalia Aid Coordination Body(STAR/SACB) activity
over the past year have marked the first time in two decades that any
effort has been made towards conserving the wildlife in southern Sudan.
After constructing a compound in Boma and providing training to game
rangers and survey participants, the group successfully executed two
wildlife surveys in Nimule and Boma National Parks. Since the start
of the civil war, both of these parks have been largely neglected and
the surveys, planned in consultation with a technical advisory group
in the region, were meant to assess the current state of wildlife in
these areas. Both surveys found a significant decrease in wildlife populations
and the Boma survey, which also looked at the state of food security,
found that since 1980 there had been an estimated 75% decline in wildlife
in the area, most notably among the white-eared kob. The cause of this
decline has been hunting by the local population, a situation worsened
by food insecurity, inter-ethnic conflict, and widespread use of small
arms in an area that has long been isolated and neglected.
The Boma survey findings were presented at a workshop held in Boma
in December 2001 that was attended by southern Sudanese technical experts,
Sudan People's Liberation Movement(SPLM) national, regional, county
leaders, as well as chiefs and women from the local communities, and
representatives from Organization for African Unity-Inter-African Bureau
for Animal Resources(OAU-IBAR), Food and Agriculture Organization(FAO),
Catholic Relief Services(CRS)-Sudan, the East African Wildlife Society,
and the wildlife department at Makerere University. Recommendations
from the workshop incorporated the community's input and laid out possible
activities in the areas of conflict reduction, enhanced livelihood security,
and sustainable natural resource management. The workshop conveners
have now combined all of these recommendations into a comprehensive
proposal for wildlife conservation in the area of Boma National Park.
Laying the Foundation for Wildlife Conservation in Southern Sudan
