|
|
| Supporting communities through environmental action | |
| Home
|
Red
hot solution to marauding elephant crop threat
17 December 2004 Source: Rex Brown, Environmental Consulting Services Chili pepper cloth has proved an effective and cost-efficient measure to deter elephants living in the Kakum National Park in Ghana from crop-raiding surrounding farms. As part of an FAO and Conservation International project, the government of Ghana is working to ease clashes between elephants from the park and the farmers who live around it. The farmers grow crops for their own consumption and sale and depend on them for their livelihoods, but the crops also attract hungry elephants. "A technique as simple as hanging chili pepper cloth around the farms has been tested and proven successful," said Peter Lowe, FAO forest conservation officer. "The farmers have suffered severe damages from elephant crop-raiding in the past. Through the project their food security has improved while they continue to coexist with the elephants," said Lowe. Wildlife in conflict with
farmers
Around the park, within a five kilometre radius, about 40 communities with 600 households live by farming. Because the farms are on land that once used to be part of the elephants' natural habitat, crops planted on the edges of the park attract elephants that stray outside the park boundaries. Elephant crop-raiding is especially severe just before harvest time, and crops can be devastated in a single night. The main food crops affected are maize, cassava, cocoyam, plantain, yam and sugar cane. The crop losses have made the
villagers hostile toward the elephants and to the idea of protecting the
national park. Some have resorted to killing the elephants illegally, putting
at risk the wildlife populations in the
Chili pepper cloth
The cloths are impregnated either by smearing them with grease that has been mixed with chili pepper powder or soaking them in oil mixed with chili powder. They are then hung on a wire around the farms. Because elephants have a highly developed sense of smell and dislike the chili, simply hanging the cloths around the farms has proved effective in deterring them from entering the farms. "It is a simple and cost-efficient method that many farmers in this area are now eager to take up," said Yaw Osei-Owusi, of Conservation International, who is the National Project Director responsible for implementing field activities. Invented in Zimbabwe, the technique is cheaper than installing and maintaining electric fences and easier and quicker than traditional methods such as burning fires and sounding drums. Contact:
|
 |
|
||||