Botswana to start auction of elephant hunting licences

 Botswana, home to the world's largest elephant population, on Friday was set to hold its first major auction for trophy elephant hunting quotas since scrapping a hunting ban last year. The sale will be conducted by a local firm from the premises of the Ministry of Environment, Nature Conservation and Tourism in the capital Gaborone.

President Mokgweetsi Masisi raised the ire of conservationists in May when he revoked a moratorium, just a year after he succeeded Ian Khama, an avid environmentalist, who introduced a blanket ban in 2014 to reverse a decline in the population of wild animals. Masisi fended off criticism of his government's decision, saying the move would not threaten the elephant population.

The government is issuing seven hunting "packages" of 10 elephants each, confined to "controlled hunting areas", a wildlife spokeswoman Alice Mmolawa told AFP on Thursday. In a text message, she said hunting would help areas most impacted by "human-wildlife conflict," a reference to elephants roaming off game parks into communities. The 2020 hunting season is expected to open in April.

Bidding is open to "companies that are either owned by Botswana citizens or are registered in Botswana," she added. Bidders must make a refundable deposit of 200,000 pula (USD 18,300) to participate.

According to an auction advisory, bidders must have "demonstrable appropriate elephant hunting experience" and have no previous wildlife criminal convictions. Hunting of collared elephants will be prohibited.

All elephant hunting expeditions will be compelled to be accompanied by a guide and a professional, at all times, according to the auction notice. Masisi's decision to lift the hunting ban last year was highly praised by local communities but derided by conservationists and ignited tension between Khama and Masisi.

He has defended his decision to end the hunting ban saying Botswana has an overpopulation of elephants and pledged to regulate the practice. His predecessor Khama was bitter.

"I have been against hunting because it represents a mentality (of) those who support it, to exploit nature for the self interest that has brought about the extinction of many species worldwide," he told AFP in a phone interview. He said allowing commercial hunting could "demotivate those who are engaged in anti-poaching, who are being told to save elephants from poachers but the regime is poaching the same elephant and calling it hunting".

Audrey Delsink, Africa's wildlife director for the global conservation lobby charity Humane Society International said: "the Botswanan elephant hunting auctions are deeply concerning and questionable". "Hunting is not an effective long-term human-elephant mitigation tool or population control method," she said from neighboring South Africa.

Neil Fitt, who heads Kalahari Conservation Society in Botswana, said hunting was a new source of revenue for the country but cautioned it had to be practiced "ethically and properly". With unfenced parks and wide-open spaces, Botswana has the world's largest elephant population with more than 135,000 animals -- about a third of the African continent's total.

Most of the animals are in the Chobe National Park, an important tourist draw. But elephants invade villages located near wildlife reserves, knocking down fences, destroying crops, and at times killing people.

(This story has not been edited by Devdiscourse staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)