EAL & PAMS fighting poaching in Tanzania, First Results of the Project

In partnership with PAMS Foundation (www.pamsfoundation.org), the Elephant Action League is supporting an anti-poaching program in Ruaha, Tanzania’s largest National Park, which forms the heart of a unique and large ecosystem, with over 4 million hectares of protected areas. With the growth in the illicit ivory trade, the Ruaha elephant population is becoming increasingly targeted.

The Project’s main objectives are:

• providing advanced training on anti-poaching

• establishing an informer network in communities adjacent to the National Park for the gathering and analysis of intelligence information needed for enabling effective preventive and reactive actions against poacher networks

• providing incentives for exemplary performance

• developing a security plan for the Park

We are happy to report some important results after the first 4 months of operations:

Training of Tanzania National Parks (TANAPA) field rangers in Ruaha National Park in best practice anti-poaching techniques in order to form a Rapid Response Team to effectively respond to poaching where needed;
22 rangers successfully completed the full course. They, together with other 19 rangers now form 2 rapid response anti-poaching teams that are deployed to react to poaching in and around the priority ivory poaching areas of Tanzania’s National Parks.
Five operations in and around Ruaha National Park were conducted using the new anti-poaching teams, with the following results:
- 8 poachers/traders arrested
- 9 tusks seized
- 2 shotguns recovered