Predator attacks on livestock across South African farms costs the agricultural economy around R2bn a year, Professor Graham Kerley, director for the Centre of African Conservation Ecology at the Nelson Mandela University in Port Elizabeth, has said.
Speaking during the launch of a book compiled from research done into the problem - Livestock Predation and its Management in South Africa: a Scientific assessment - Kerley said that against the country’s larger GDP backdrop the R2bn loss in revenue was relatively small given the multitude of challenges facing the economy.
But predation still has a significant enough impact on rural economies because of the effect it has on job creation and food security.
Kerley expressed his hope that the book could be used to guide policy aimed at the environmentally sensitive curbing of predator attacks on livestock in rural communities.
The Predation Management Forum of South Africa (PMFSA) has confirmed that predators are a problem and one that seems to be largely ignored by the relevant government departments.
PMFSA chair Guillau du Toit has since said that a working group will be held in February to thrash out strategies alongside key policy makers next February, in keeping with the Centre’s findings.
Deputy DG of the Department for Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries (Daff), Joe Kgobokoe, has confirmed that Daff will be part of the PMFSA’s initiative.
SK Makinara, a board member of Cape Wools, said the problem was particularly prevalent among rural communities where flocks could number up to 60 and where the inability to stop predators, unlike commercially stronger farms, caused havoc for rural farmers.
