Translocating 263 elephants from Liwonde National Park to Kasungu National Park

In Malawi, conserving elephant populations while meeting the needs of people forms a major part of the country’s overall biodiversity conservation approach. Buffered by Tanzania in the north, Mozambique in the south and east and Zambia to the west, this tiny country is making bold and progressive steps in the name of elephant conservation.
Thanks to sound conservation management, Malawi’s elephant numbers are increasing exponentially. But despite hosting some of Africa’s most successful national parks, Malawi’s protected areas lie fragmented from each other - meaning its elephants can no longer migrate naturally. In this case, translocations become a vital part of the country’s elephant management strategy to simulate the natural occurrence of migration from areas where large numbers occur, to areas where there are unviable elephant populations.
After three years of planning, and over a one-month period, African Parks, in partnership with Malawi’s Government and the International Fund for Animal Welfare (IFAW), moved 263 elephants from Liwonde National Park in the south to Kasungu National Park in the north-west of the country.
Liwonde’s elephant numbers had swelled to almost 600 elephants, impacting on the park’s biodiversity and increasing the risk of human-elephant conflict situations in surrounding villages. The result of this challenging and massive move will alleviate elephant pressure in and around the park while creating a viable population in Kasungu where, until now, only 120 elephants existed. At 2,100km2, Kasungu is the second largest national park in Malawi and is four times the size of Liwonde.
As icons of the African continent, elephants are also a major tourist attraction. By adding to Kasungu’s numbers, the parks’ value as a source of socio-economic stability for thousands of community members has been significantly enhanced.