The P&W Initiative - People & Wildlife

The Partnership
The P&W initiative is a partnership between the Wildlife Conservation Research Unit (WildCRU) and Born Free Foundation. Our combined skills and experience in conservation and working with local peoples are complementary. We bring a professional, multi-disciplinary approach to trying to resolve a complex range of issues. While WildCRU has been working chiefly on what makes animal populations 'tick', and on ways how to ensure their survival, Born Free Foundation has traditionally been more concerned with the welfare of individual animals.
	WildCRU: our mission is to solve conservation and environmental problems through rigorous scientific research. Founded in 1986 it has become the largest wildlife conservation research unit in Europe. WildCRU is part of the University of Oxford. WildCRU has wildlife conservation projects worldwide and has undertaken many studies aimed at understanding and helping to resolve the complex relationship between wildlife, humans, the environment and the health of humans and livestock.
	Born Free Foundation: Founded by Bill Travers and Virginia McKenna, following their roles in the classic film, Born Free, the Foundation has traditionally been concerned with the welfare of individual animals. BFF runs highly effective campaigns to prevent animal persecution as well as increase public awareness of environmental and conservation issues. Among others, it funds the Ethiopian Wolf Conservation Programme, which protects this rarest of African carnivores; runs a 'surrogacy action plan' for orphaned polar bear cubs in Canada and provides anti-poaching support to remove deadly snares in Kenya's Masai Mara and Zimbabwe's Hwange.

Improving communication: the P&W website
Existing efforts to resolve or mitigate conflicts between people and animals are often fragmented and sometimes efforts are duplicated due to poor communication. A quick search of the web show that sites on human-wildlife conflict are invariably biased towards certain conflicts (e.g. livestock predation), or a certain region or country, thus failing to tackle a more integrated approach. Thus the creation of the P&W website is a crucial step in generating the conditions for a fruitful communication forum for all people involved in human-wildlife issues.

Delivering advice.
The People & Wildlife Advisory Service offers assistance with planning, liaison and fundraising to people seeking help with wildlife conflict issues. This source of expertise may be made available to those people in need or alternatively be 'charged out' to existing projects, NGOs or governments on a case-by-case basis.

Contact us: info@peopleandwildlife.org.uk

Research & developing case studies
We draw expertise from a series of case studies across the globe. The experiences and lessons learnt by those in the coal-face are exchanged through the P&W initiative. Many of these case studies test systematically the success of specific approaches, while at the same time address the source of conflict and seek its resolution.

Some WildCRU projects that address conflict
	The Ethiopian Wolf Conservation Programme - EWCP's alternative approach to protect Ethiopian wolves from transmission of rabies from domestic dogs involves education towards responsible dog ownership and vaccination of dogs, while the local community and livestock benefit from increased health provision and access to free veterinary care. EWCP website
	Modelling strategies for human-wildlife conflict mitigation - Exploring ways of optimizing conflict analysis and resolution, using the jaguar as a case study. A survey and GIS analysis of jaguar-human conflicts across Latin American is underway to identify socio-economic and natural determinants of conflict and the combinations of solutions that are most likely to lead to successful conflict management. (DPhil student Alexandra Zimmermann) In collaboration with Chester Zoo
	The Painted Dog Project - This project in Zimbabwe has been very successful in protecting this endangered carnivore by working with the local community to reduce wildlife deaths in snares and improve livestock husbandry. (DPhil student Gregory Rassmussen) Painted Dog Conservation website
	Conserving lions in Zimbabwe. Study of an exploited lion population, in and adjacent to Hwange National Park.The project is provides opportunities for discourse between the different stake-holders, such as safari operators and guides, professional hunting guides and the Zimbabwean National Parks and Wildlife Authority, involved in lion management and sustainable use. (Dr. Andrew Loveridge; DPhil student Zeke Davidson) Hwange Lion Research website
	Human dimensions of wildlife conservation on the Amazon frontier. This project addresses wildlife conservation on the Amazon frontier by gaining an understanding, and so influencing, the relationships between people and wildlife. More specifically, the project works with migrant farmers and ranchers around Cristalino State Park to resolve their conflicts with wildlife and increase their support of the park.(DPhil student, Silvio Marchini). Project website
	Resolving human-wildlife conflict and enhancing carnivore conservation in Bhutan. In Jigme Singye Wangchuck National Park tigers and leopards cause significant economic and social losses, exacerbating farmers’ low income status and lack of economic prospects. This project aims to reduce conflicts through initiatives that provide alternative economic incentives to farmers, and by implementing conservation programmes to protect top carnivores. (DPhil student Sonam Wang) Project website
	Carnivores of the Mongolian steppe. A project aimed at understanding the fundamental community ecology of carnivores in grassland and semi-deserts and the biological impacts of hunting. Seeking to implement one of the first conservation programmes for carnivores in Mongolia.(DPhil student, Jed Murdoch) Mongolia Carnivore Project website
	Makgadikgadi Lion Research Project. A small lion population in Makgadikgadi National Park, Botswana is under threat from indiscriminate illegal killings with gin traps or poison. This study clarified the patterns and causes of conflict between lions and people, the principle cause of anti-wildlife sentiment in the area. The project helped to improve livestock husbandry practices and to reduce the killings by increased border patrols. (ex DPhil student, Graham Hensom)
BBF projects that address conflict
	Helping to protect tigers in central India - A project that operates within a landscape framework of interconnected tiger populations in the Satpura range, providing financial support for the implementation by local NGOs of emerging projects. Each local team implements adaptable project modules that encompass population monitoring and surveys, measurements of human-wildlife conflict, assistance in legal prosecutions and to people during translocations. Satpura Landscape Tiger Project website
	Grey wolves- Research by Colorado State University testing various non-lethal devices for repelling grey wolves, including the use of sound and electric deterrents triggered automatically when wolves approach livestock. Various methods are already in use to prevent carnivores from killing domestic stock, but this is the first field experiment designed to test quantitatively whether these non-lethal methods are successful.
	Management of livestock to reduce wolf predation in Slovakia. Livestock guarding dogs are trained and distributed to farmers to repel wolf attacks. Additionally the effectiveness of Conditioned Taste Aversion techniques is being tested in sheep farms.

Protocols for conflict resolution
From this ongoing work several generalisations are emerging and lessons can be learnt. These are presented in field guidebooks for specific animal groups, which are available to field users through Conflict Resolution Manuals

Books and meetings
We hosted a one-day international conference in Oxford to publicise the activities of the P&W initiative and promote the need for an integrated approach to wildlife conservation. Several renowned speakers and an audience of government officers, NGOs, sponsors and scientists were invited.

The Conservation and Action Plan of the Canidae for the 21st century (426KB) (edited by Claudio Sillero and David Macdonald, published by the IUCN) was finalized in 2004, following an international Canid Biology & Conservation Conference, hosted by P&W and co-sponsored by Born Free and Oxford University. To produce this new Action Plan 88 specialists contributed as authors, and a further 90 acted as critics and reviewers, updating the information on 36 taxa of canids from around the world.