These are not only the horns of a dead Kudu bull, but could also be a trophy earning the learners’ poverty-stricken parents a good income. To make this a reality, Namibia’s unique resources of wildlife need to be conserved and well managed. As part of our course designed for grade 9 - 12 learners, CCF’s Chris Gordon taught the importance of ecosystem management and exposed them to the idea of conservancies. This has given these learners the first step to become Namibia’s conservancy members in the years to come.

Because Namibian cheetahs live on farmland, conservancies and their wildlife management techniques are extremely important for long-term cheetah conservation. Today, conservancies are a growing movement throughout Namibia, and are playing a leading role in the conservation effort. Free-hold conservancies consist of adjacent farms that are linked through cooperative natural resource management, guided by a management plan. Conservation biologists increasingly emphasize that protected areas alone are simply not large enough to sustain the wildlife they were created to protect. Therefore, it is increasingly clear that a focus on conservation on private and communal farmland is crucial.

Again, it is important to remember that Namibia’s land is not arable for the most part, so game and livestock farms are in many cases the only possible source of income.

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