The drivers of illegal wildlife activities in Moyowosi game reserve

Abstract

Illegal wildlife activity poses a serious danger to the fragile ecological balance of Moyowosi Game Reserve, which is primarily a marsh surrounded by pristine wilderness. This paper comprehensively examined the drivers of illegal wildlife activities occurring in the reserve. Data were gathered from 383 respondents through household questionnaires across ten proximal, systematically selected villages in Kigoma. Most of the respondents were of the age between 18-40 from south sampling location n=148(79.14%). The analysis revealed that the major drivers of illegal wildlife activities, based on strong agreement among respondents, were subsistence-based n=236 (61.62%), commercial based n=214 (55.87%), and insufficient land for grazing n=190 (49.61%). These findings were derived from a total sample size of 383 respondents for each driver, with varying levels of agreement including agree, undecided, disagree, and strongly disagree. However, insufficient land for agriculture, waterbodies for fishing, source of fuelwood, crop yield, high market value, increase of foreigners and influence of refugees and illegal immigrants are other identified drivers of illegal activities. Further, the result showed that, the highly committed illegal wildlife activities in Moyowosi Game Reserve are poaching n=199(51.96%), illegal fishing n=196(51.17%) and illegal grazing n=166(43.34%). Among other strategies, this paper recommends increased community involvement, enforcement efforts, increased use of technology like drones in patrols, encourage the youth to establish groups and offering micro-credit loans to establish small businesses. Furthermore, this study recommends increasing conservation education and awareness campaigns within communities, including school children. It also suggests that the government should consider locating refugee camps far from protected areas in the future and emphasize village land use planning.