On August 31, results of the 2022 Kavango Zambezi Transfrontier Conservation Area (KAZA) elephant survey were announced. Established in 2011 and covering 106 million acres across parts of Angola, Botswana, Namibia, Zambia, and Zimbabwe, KAZA is the world’s largest transboundary conservation landscape. The much-anticipated results from the first-of-its-kind survey show exactly what hunters, outfitters, and southern African governments have known all along: elephants are stable or increasing throughout the region. The estimated elephant population for the region was calculated at 227,900. This represents an increase from the IUCN’s 2016 African Elephant Status Report, which estimated a combined 216,970 elephants in the KAZA region, despite ongoing claims from anti-hunters and overzealous regulators that elephants are going extinct. The survey results also represent a triumph for the five partner countries, who successfully coordinated an unprecedented robust transnational survey that covers an area roughly the size of France. SCI applauds the range states and their wildlife management agencies who helped produce these invaluable survey results.
• More Information (Link): https://www.kavangozambezi.org/2023/08/31/kaza-launches-its-2022-kaza-elephant-survey-results/