Villagers by the Okavango Delta earn cash when cameras catch elephants

Two Botswana villages are paid for wildlife photos from camera traps they host, a modest scheme that has so far paid out about $4,175 this year.

Two rural communities on the edge of Botswana's Okavango Delta are now being paid for sharing their land with wildlife. Residents of Gogomoga and Tsutsubega installed cameras around their villages, and they earn money for photographs of animals such as elephants and lions. The scheme is part of Harmony with Wildlife, run by the nonprofit Wild Impact and the safari company &Beyond.

The idea grew out of a compensation effort. In April 2024, community rangers began helping residents document wildlife damage so they could claim compensation from Botswana's wildlife department. That documentation led to camera traps, deployed with Wild Impact in a way meant to avoid intruding on privacy. Rangers check the cameras weekly and download the photos. Pay varies by species, with elephants paying the most. Wild Impact pays quarterly into an account in the communities' names, managed through the local council, and villagers decide together how to spend it. This year the program has paid 57,600 pula (about $4,175), mostly for elephant and spotted hyena sightings.

The villages each have fewer than 500 residents and no paved roads, schools, shops or electricity. For people who bear the costs of living beside elephants, a payment tied to the animals' presence turns a liability into income, and the community controls the money. That is a different footing from conservation that asks locals to tolerate losses for benefits that go elsewhere.

The caveats are real. The payments are deliberately modest, because Wild Impact funds them itself rather than relying on donors, according to its CEO. No results on coexistence or reduced conflict have been reported yet. The people quoted on the scheme's operation work for Wild Impact, and only one outside expert, who was not involved, is quoted, welcoming the approach. Watch whether payments grow and whether conflict actually falls.

Source: Mongabay