01/08/2017
Leadership insights from the bush..
Last weekend, I rode my bike past a lion who was hiding in the bushes right next to the path I was on. What made me do such a crazy thing? Well, let me tell you why: I was part of a group of 11 people that spent the weekend at the absolutely spectacular Jaci's Lodges, Madikwe Game Reserve, South Africa to raise funds for Rhino conservation. As part of the fundraiser, we got to ride our bikes through the game reserve. It was an amazing and breathtaking (figuratively and literally) experience. While I only cycled a short bit (I spent the rest of the time in the comfort and safety of a Land Rover vehicle thank you very much), my fellow bush adventurers rode an impressive 60 km over the course of two game drives. We saw an incredible array of wildlife— zebra, kudu, lions, elephants, giraffes and even 2 rhinos, and were spoiled by Jaci and Jan van Heteren, the lovely owners of the safari lodge.
During the fundraising auction on the closing night, I was astonished and saddened to learn the staggering facts behind rhino poaching in South Africa. Below are the statistics showing how many rhinos were killed in South Africa between 2006 and 2016.
2006 - 36
2007 - 13
2008 - 83
2009 - 122
2010 - 333
2011 - 448
2012 - 668
2013 - 1004
2014 - 1215
2015 - 1175
2016 – 1054
Notice how rhino poaching was at a relatively low level before 2009? From 2009 onwards, the numbers drastically shot up and now we are losing one rhino every 8 hours. As I listened to these statistics, I couldn’t help but wonder if this problem, like almost all our problems in Africa, could also be traced to poor leadership? It’s clear that something changed from 2009 onwards in South Africa that enabled rhino poaching to shoot up to such astronomical levels. Was it the fact that South Africa strengthened its trade ties with China in 2010 (and that China and Vietnam are the biggest buyers of Rhino horn, which they believe has aphrodisiac properties?) Was it the fact that president Jacob Zuma was elected in 2009 and that poor governance and corruption in South Africa shot up and have continued to rise since then (as we’re seeing with the latest Gupta saga)?
It’s clear to me that for this magnitude of wildlife devastation to occur, there must be collusion at every level along the chain. This is not just an issue of poverty-stricken poachers killing animals to survive. There is an international crime syndicate that reaches the highest levels of society and government. I learned that night at Jaci’s Lodges that one Rhino horn fetches about $800,000 by the time it gets to its end users in China. Yet the poachers themselves only about $1,500 per horn.
For this collusion to happen, leadership must be failing at every level of the chain. There must be corruption at some of the national parks or game reserves where poaching is taking place. Those who run the customs & excise departments at airports and border posts must be enabling the exports of the rhino horns. Leaders in the police force and those in the judicial system must be playing their part. Diplomats on either side (those from China and Vietnam in SA, and those representing South Africa in the Far East) are clearly not doing enough to stop this, or worse, are enabling it and enjoying its spoils. Good leadership is lacking from top to bottom.
Living and working across Africa, I’ve learned that although on the surface many of our challenges may appear to be caused by one thing, once you scratch the surface (and in this case see how much money is being made at the top of the chain vs what the poachers at the bottom get), you find that the problem inevitably boils down to bad leadership. This is exactly why I am focusing my life’s efforts on improving the quality of leadership in Africa through initiatives like African Leadership Academy, African Leadership University (ALU), and African Leadership Network.
At ALU, we are doing our part to address this leadership issue with our School of Wildlife Conservation. As a result of this school (which is one of 14 we will eventually set up to address 7 grand challenges and 7 great opportunities facing Africa), 100% of the 3million leaders we are developing over the next few decades will be exposed to some basic courses on wildlife conservation. A subset of these leaders will then choose conservation as their focus when they do our unique BA degree in Global Challenges, and will have to spend 4 months of each academic year in an internship in the conservation sector (meaning they will graduate with one year of work experience in conservation).
We also believe that unless communities who live next to protected wildlife areas see the economic benefits of wildlife conservation, they will have no incentive to conserve it. This is why we recently awarded 10 full scholarships to senior leaders already working in the conservation sector (e.g. from World Wildlife Fund Zimbabwe and Tanzania National Parks Authority) to participate in our executive MBA program at the ALU School of Business. We hope to improve their leadership skills and enable them to use business thinking to improve the sustainability of their conservation efforts and create economic benefits for communities around the game parks. We will also soon launch short leadership and management courses for senior leaders in conservation across Africa to drive some immediate improvements in their skills.
Let’s put our minds together to stop this scourge against one of our most treasured African ‘assets’— the incredible wildlife that only our continent has been blessed with.
What else do we need to do to hold our leaders accountable to stopping things like poaching? How can we make wildlife more of an African ‘asset’, that communities benefit from instead of something that is just locked away for the benefit of foreign tourists?
By Fred Swaniker
