Save Kasanka National Park!
Kasanka Trust has submitted a statement to the Zambia Environmental Management Agency (ZEMA) urging them to refuse permission for a commercial agriculture development that would severely impact on the integrity of the Park’s ecosystems. The fate of the Park hangs in the balance, as we await ZEMA’s decision.
Meanwhile, the Zambian Ministry of Energy has signed an implementation agreement to build Zambia’s first wind energy plant. The proposed location is directly in the flightpath of Kasanka’s internationally important migratory colony of straw-coloured fruit bats and poses a severe threat to the population.
Kasanka National Park receives the highest level of protection in Zambia because of the unique flora and fauna that it supports. Up to ten million fruit bats migrate to the wetlands in Kasanka for a few months every year. It’s a globally significant biological spectacle that draws in tourists and helps to underpin the fastest growing economic sector in Zambia.
But the habitat immediately surrounding the Park, designated as the Kafinda Game Management Area (GMA), is being illegally deforested by Lake Agro Industries (a subsidiary of the Tanzanian Lake Group). They also propose to abstract significant amounts of water from the Luwombwa River, which feeds the Kasanka ecosystem as well as supporting the livelihoods of many local communities. Another subsidiary of Lake Group, Gulf Adventures, has occupied 5,000ha of the GMA, encroaching into the National Park itself, and has introduced non-native species to the area.
Kasanka’s fruit bats make nightly foraging excursions not only into the GMA, but often as far as Pensulo, approximately 50km south-southeast of Kasanka National Park, which is the proposed location for the new Pensulo Wind Farm. Commuting straw-coloured fruit bats fly at a height that makes them extremely vulnerable to collision with turbines. Wind turbines pose one of the largest threats to bat populations worldwide, with research from North America, Europe and South Africa documenting mass mortality of bats at wind energy plants.
Both of these developments pose a major threat to Kasanka National Park and the world’s largest concentration of mammals. This would not only threaten the tourism industry in Zambia, but would have far reaching ecological consequences across Central Africa, with the fruit bats being critical for seed dispersal and reforestation.
Kasanka Trust works closely with local farmers in the Kafinda GMA to implement sustainable and efficient Climate-Smart farming techniques and livelihoods, reaching at least 22,000 people in 2020. In addition, we support 20 schools with environmental education programmes and have built teacher housing at three. 180 young people have been sponsored through schooling, seven of which have gone on to obtain bachelor degrees and three now have diplomas in teaching.
Our aim is to provide long-term sustainable solutions for supporting the community, which work in harmony with the protection of Zambia’s natural resources. These efforts would be compromised by the effects of the harmful development that is being proposed.
Following our recent campaign (Proposed World Heritage Site under threat), Kasanka Trust submitted an objection to Lake Agro Industries’ application, which aims to try and get formal permission for the farm. The statement from Kasanka was supported by over 40 organisations from Zambia and beyond, representing the tourism industry, community groups, conservation NGOs, filmmakers and researchers. We are also aware of at least 500 separate representations made to ZEMA by organisations and members of the public.
But we cannot stop there! We must urge the Zambian government to resist all development that threatens Kasanka National Park and its wildlife. Positive development that brings food security, jobs and renewable energy to the Zambia people should be encouraged, but this must only be permitted in appropriate locations where the negative impacts on the environment and local community do not outweigh the benefits.
PLEASE HELP US:
- Sign our petition – https://www.change.org/p/president-edgar-chagwa-lungu-save-kasanka-national-park to make sure your voice is heard;
- Share the news as widely as possible and encourage others to sign; and
- Donate to our cause https://kasanka.com/donate/ – even a small donation can help us to cover costs for a media campaign, printing documents, fuel to attend meetings with stakeholders and obtaining legal representation when required.
World Land Trust (WLT) is an international conservation charity that protects the world’s most biologically significant and threatened habitats acre by acre.
Kasanka National Park and its unique biodiversity is a truly wonderful asset to the Zambian nation. It should be inviolate and nurtured and its integrity ensured for the future.
We had a wonderful trip experiencing the nature of Zambia two years ago and more than anything would love to re-visit and explore this delightful country.
I implore the political leaders to show vision and not destroy anything that could be used to enrich the nation, such as the overwhelming bat spectacle and all the other rich natural wealth of fauna and flora.
A terrible threat – ecologically and economically (although that’s secondary)..
Save the national park