Field blog written by our international  intern, Alexandra Wall LEARNING FROM OTHER WOMEN’S GROUPS IN THE AREA The focus of my summer internship has been developing the groundwork for establishing a Women’s Enterprise Center in Mwakoma. Rather than start from ground zero and reinvent the wheel, we instead visited several women’s groups in the area to learn from their experiences. How and why did these groups start? What income generating…

Field blog written by our international  intern, Alexandra Wall ELEPHANT CROP RAIDS AND POVERTY Save the Elephants’ (STE) Elephants and Bees Research Center is based in Mwakoma village, one of four villages in Lower Sagalla located roughly 10km from Tsavo East National Park in Kenya. Here, subsistence farming is the primary income-generating activity for households. In Mwakoma and surrounding communities, human-wildlife conflict is one of the leading factors contributing to…

The views, opinions and position expressed in this article belong solely to the author and do not necessarily reflect the policy and position of Save the Elephants Report written by our International Intern, Acacia Jennings The Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (CITES) forms international agreements that regulate plant and animal trade. Its purpose is to ensure that the trade of wild animals and…

The views, opinions and position expressed in this article belong solely to the author and do not necessarily reflect the policy and position of Save the Elephants Field Report written by our Kenyan intern Ephie Lumumba ELEPHANT MONITORING Our journey started at 9 AM from the camp in search of two collared elephants, Manolo and EQ at Lake Jipe. On the way, we got to see more elephant families and…

Report written by our Kenyan Intern, Peter Ochieng Sagalla is located in Voi Constituency, Taita Taveta County. The Sagalla community has a long history of human-elephant conflict. A community is a group of people living in a geographic area, with ties of kinship and marriage, have complex characteristics of knowledge and habitats and share interest and control resource. The Elephants and Bees Project has had a significant impact on the Sagalla…

Field blog by Kenyan Intern, Purity Mwongeli Before the introduction of beehive fences, communities in Sagalla area were in constant conflict with elephants. Elephants use migratory routes, some of which pass through the area. The farmers used every method possible to scare away the elephants and stop them from raiding their farms, sometimes resolving to use of weapons. In the process of scaring them away, some of these elephants would charge…

Field blog written by our Kenyan Intern, Zachary Mutinda Lucy King was the name that my mentor kept mentioning to me shortly after they had been to Samburu working with ‘Save The Elephants’, commonly referred to as STE. When that name was mentioned, we all thought of collared elephants, research that has played a major role in elephant monitoring in Africa and beyond. I looked into the name Lucy King…

Field report by Ewan Brennan, Mobile Unit Leader & Project Logistics Manager Human-elephant conflict is always a complex problem. Factors such as land history, farming practices, education, geography and rainfall can all interplay to result in a dynamic and dangerous conflict scenario that can be detrimental to the balance of both communities and elephants living together in peace. Elephant impacts on livelihoods, food security and personal safety can understandably lead to…

Report by our Community and Livelihoods Research Assistant, Victor Ndombi Forest cover in Kenya stands at about 6.8%, for us to achieve UN recommended 10% cover, we have to plant more trees and avoid illegal logging. Charcoal burning is the main source of livelihoods to many communities in Kenya, but have we thought of its negative impacts on the ecosystem and environment as a whole? The cutting down of trees…

Report by our Community and Livelihoods Research Assistant, Victor Ndombi During my time as a community livelihood and conflict reduction intern, I came to learn how agriculture, women empowerment and elephant conservation go hand in hand in a community. It is popular opinion that agriculture and elephant conservation are mutually exclusive but if done right, these different and seemingly opposing concepts can be integrated, to work together.  Women empowerment On…