Wildlife and tourism top Beijing agenda

The Kenya Wildlife Service, a government conservation and management agency, has announced its plans to visit the State Forestry Administration in China to promote existing collaboration efforts. A delegation of six Kenyan officials, led by the acting director-general, will visit Beijing on the nine-day visit from April 21 to 30.

"China and Kenya continue to work closely to conserve our wildlife. This visit will touch on the memorandum of understanding signed between our governments during Premier Li Keqiang's visit in mid-2014," says William Kiprono, acting director-general of the Kenya Wildlife Service at a media briefing at the agency's headquarters in Nairobi.

During Li's state visit last year, 17 agreements were signed, including a deal for surveillance and night vision equipment worth $530,000. China also provided $10 million to support wildlife protection and conservation in Africa.

The visit this month comes at a time when Kenya faces dwindling wildlife and fauna numbers caused by loss of habitat, poaching and climate change.

Kiprono says the two countries have stepped up their efforts to combat illegal ivory trafficking. In recent months, China and Kenya have undertaken stringent efforts to address the illegal sale of ivory.

Last month, the Kenyan government burned 15 metric tons of ivory and increased vigilance at its ports while imposing stiffer penalties on criminals found having ivory trophies, while China banned the import of ivory carvings for a year, destroyed six tons of confiscated ivory tusks and carvings in Guangzhou, Guangdong province, and required courts to step up their prosecution of criminals suspected of trafficking ivory.

"We will discuss progress made and how we can partner to scale up our conservation efforts," Kiprono says.

There has been commendable collaboration between Kenya and China, he says.

"We have been awarded a joint award of recognition by the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species, which proves we are committed to fight dealers of ivory on both sides."

The delegation from Kenya Wildlife Service is also scheduled to meet tour operators and non-state actors who also have a commercial presence in Kenya.

During the visit, strategies to shore up Chinese tourism numbers will also be discussed. China has been identified as one of Kenya's top 10 tourist source markets, though the latest figures show that tourist numbers have dipped 9.8 percent, from 34,923 to 31,486.

According to a Kenya tourism agency, Chinese visitors have shunned the hospitality market due to Africa's recent Ebola epidemic and safety reasons.

While emphasizing that the nation's conflicts are confined to certain areas, Kiprono reveals that the slump in the tourist market will have wide-reaching consequences to the agency's mandate of wildlife management and conservation. The agency is therefore promoting other alternative sources of revenue.

"We have started a conservation endowment fund that will sustain our operations irrespective of difficulties experienced in the sector," says Kiprono. The agency aims to pool $100 million in funds over a 10-year period.

Other conservation programs such as animal adoption, wheelbarrow racing and cycling with the rhinos (held annually at Lake Nakuru National Park) will also be promoted to the Chinese market. The acting director-general added that Kenya's hospitality sector is working on translating its marketing materials into Chinese to make it easier for visitors.

"China is our good friend and we want them to believe it," says Kiprono.

He promises to consider launching internship programs in partnership with Chinese universities.

The Kenya wildlife tourism market contributes 70 percent to the nation's tourism industry, which in turn contributes 12 percent to the national economy. It has 34,000 elephants, the fourth largest total in the world, and 1,041 rhinos, the third largest herd globally.

lucymorangi@chinadaily.com.cn

(China Daily Africa Weekly 04/17/2015 page3)