Private Game Reserves in Southern Africa

Wildlife in southern Africa long had a res nullius status (‘belongs to no one’). During the Great Trek, the Boers, leaving the Cape Colony during the first half of the nineteenth century, relied to a large extent on the hunting of wildlife to sustain themselves on their great journey north. Hunting for meat became part of the culture of the Afrikaners (those from Dutch decent) and they dried the meat to become biltong which they could eat for months without any preservatives or refrigeration on their journeys with the ox wagons or on horseback. But because hunting was not regulated up to the middle of the twentieth century, exploitation occurred and some of these pioneers started producing biltong on a commercial scale without having to pay for the meat. In addition, the country experienced a rapid decline in the numbers of foreign trophy hunters coming to South Africa because of the limited free range wildlife available outside of the public protected areas. Furthermore, the viral disease Rinderpest came into northern Africa in 1888 and moved southward reaching South Africa by 1896. In its wake, it not only killed cattle but also large numbers of wildlife species. Outbreaks of another disease (Nagana) also occurred in the Natal province in 1929. This outbreak led to the deaths of some 35,000 animals in a matter of 2 years between the years 1929 and 1931 (Bigalke 1950). Most of these wildlife mortalities were the result of government shooting aimed at preventing the spread of the disease. The use of the chemical DDT was also widespread to eradicate the tsetse fly that transmitted the disease. This led to the almost extermination of wildlife in Natal. Game reserves – already established in 1895 – were not spared in the Nangana eradication campaign, making the intense differences between conservationists and cattle farmers visible, the former being against the shooting of animals for disease prevention, while the latter being in favor thereof. Many of these farmers and their descendants were later grateful for these very conservation areas because they became the sources for stock in the development of private wildlife ranches.

The extermination of wildlife contributed to the establishment of public protected areas like national parks and reserves. With hunting being prohibited in public protected areas and little wildlife left to hunt outside these areas, the idea of game ranching emerged. A key player in this evolution was Dr. Reay Smithers, retired director of the Rhodesia National Museums and author of the book ‘The mammals of the southern African sub-region’ (Smithers 1983). He invited Dasmann and Mossman, two promising natural science researchers from the USA, to the then southern Rhodesia in 1959. Their assignment was to study a large tract of land of about 55,000 ha in the Rhodesian lowveld to establish if wildlife could be ranched like cattle and/or in combination with cattle. Carruthers (2008) concludes that not only could wildlife be ranched in combination with cattle, but could also be ranched on its own in a profitable way. Such research marked the birth of the game ranching industry in southern Africa. For instance, by the mid-1970s, 17 large game ranches existed in Zimbabwe representing about 9 % of the 179 that received cropping permits in 1973 from the government. The total area of these ranches was 1,721,845 ha of which 111,541 ha was utilized for game only (Mossman and Mossman 1976).

In South Africa the need for action was also prevalent. By 1960 wildlife numbers in South Africa were the lowest ever. It was estimated that only about 500,000 wild animals occurred in the whole of the country, including public protected areas like national parks and reserves. Only about 200 white rhinoceros at that time occurred in the whole of South Africa, bontebok numbers were estimated to be 19 and mountain zebra 90. One of the key visionary players and innovators in both institutional wildlife conservation and private game ranching in Natal and in the rest of the country was Dr. Ian Player. He was born in 1927 and joined the Natal Parks Board in 1952 and became warden of the Umfolozi Game Reserve. His first focus was the very low numbers of certain species, in particular the white rhino that was almost locally extinct. They basically only occurred in the Umfolozi Game Reserve and he started ‘Operation Rhino’ in the late 1960s by relocating rhinos to other protected habitat. He and his co-workers pioneered the chemical capture technique of wildlife and rhino in particular, as well as the care and transportation. Safe breeding herds were established in other parts of the country and in Kruger National Park, and their numbers increased rapidly. Today at the age of 87 Dr. Ian Player is still actively involved in the conservation debate, supporting the legalization of trade in rhino horn as a stimulus to the game ranching industry to save the species.

Another visionary and innovator in the 1960s was Dr. Anton Rupert who founded the South African Nature Foundation and suggested and financed the establishment of the first chair in Wildlife Management at the University of Pretoria. Prof. J. du P. Bothma became the first incumbent of this chair. He edited the first handbook on ‘Game Ranch Management’, which became ‘the bible’ of this industry up to today and is now in its 9^th edition. The academic chair later grew into the Centre for Wildlife Management. This academic centre made a significant contribution to wildlife management in southern Africa by educating some 600 post-graduate students who took up leading wildlife management positions in the country like directors of national parks and private ranch managers. In sum, game ranching in southern Africa emerged as a response to the rapid extinction of wildlife both inside and outside national parks.

Prior to the 1980s, breeding and sustainable use of suitable wild herbivore species in farming systems was seldom seen as an agricultural activity (Ramsay and Musetha 2008). The use of wild herbivores in farming systems was generally seen as an activity regulated by legislation, administered by nature conservation structures at government and provincial level. Nevertheless, as far back as the early 1930s, some landowners did allow wildlife on their farms and more than two decades later they discovered that land with some wildlife on it sold at higher prices than land without wildlife (Bothma 2010). Moreover, some landowners harvested wildlife to commercially produce biltong. For instance, in the Orange Free State this was common with blesbok and in the Central and Northern Cape many springbucks were harvested. This was technically illegal because wildlife did not belong to the landowner. At this era, nowhere else in the world did wildlife belong to landowners. With the state, via the provinces, receiving a fair income in the selling of hunting licences, there was also little interest in legally making wildlife the property of the landowner.

Yet, the seed had been planted. Wildlife had a monetary value to the landowner on whose land it occurred. Writings in environmental, outdoor and agricultural magazines and research publications started to promote game ranching (e.g. Stevenson-Hamilton 1947; Transvaal Province 1945; Vincent 1962; Skinner 1967, 1970; Skead 1948, 1950; Lundholm 1952; Kettlitz 1962). The changing discourse influenced the then Department of Nature Conservation of the Transvaal Province that started giving serious attention to the private ownership of wildlife. Governmental opposition against this private ownership was to be found in two departments. First, the National Department of Agriculture did not recognize wildlife ranching as a legitimate agricultural practice. Second, the Department of Veterinary Services viewed wildlife only as a threat to domestic stock in terms of transmitting diseases.

Nevertheless, the growing awareness of the monetary value of wildlife, the academic studies that were offered at the University of Pretoria since 1965 and an increasing number of research papers (e.g. Skinner 1967, 1970; Luxmoore 1985; Kok 1984) created a more positive attitude in government towards wildlife conservation on public land and game ranching on private land. Only in 1987 did the Department of Agricultural Development formally recognize wildlife ranching as a fully-fledged agricultural activity. It was seen as viable alternative to more conventional forms of animal agriculture by producing both meat and a range of value-added products and activities. From this time forward, then, private game reserves could also request government support in the form of subsidies in times of drought or other natural disasters just as was the case with standard livestock farms. PGRs’ financial statements were also to be included in individual’s total income/loss for tax purposes. In sum, in 1987 wildlife ownership moved from a res nullius status to private ownership.

This change led to a spectacular growth in the industry, mainly driven by wildlife price increases, improvements in game capture techniques and transportation as well as the status symbol that became attached to owning a PGR. As this industry grew over the years, various organizations were started to represent the game ranchers in lobbying government, but these were usually provincial. Later, two main organizations in South Africa were launched to represent the game ranchers: the Northern Wildlife Organization and the South African Game Ranchers Organization. These amalgamated in 2005 to become Wildlife Ranching South Africa (WRSA), a national body and the single official non-profit organization representing the game ranchers. It currently has 1,500 members. WRSA’s main function is to liaise closely between the game ranchers, non-governmental and governmental authorities to ensure a healthy working relationship, assisting governmental authorities with the setting up of policies, regulations and norms and standards applicable to the wildlife industry.¹ This has resulted in new policies such as the Meat Scheme Act 40 of 2000, Damage Causing Animals, Alien and Invasive Species, Threatened or Protected Species, Hunting Norms and Standards.² WRSA also represents the wildlife industry on the National Wildlife Forum, a forum initiated by the Minister of Environmental Affairs and Tourism. Regular district meetings are held as well as an annual general assembly and a comprehensive quarterly magazine is published. In addition, a free newsletter is distributed, an online shop exists and game auctions are arranged. As such, game ranching became a recognizable and significant sector in the South African economy. In order to mature, however, three main challenges in game ranching needed to be addressed, which are discussed in the sections below.