Namibia - In the Etosha National Park

Mark Jago is trekking through the bush for weeks now. In May, when rain is over, it is high season in Namibia for the trapping of wild animals. “On the first glance it seems contradictory, that we hunt elephants, rhinos and giraffes. We anaesthesize them, we stress them – and we do all that even though we are the ones who are responsible for their welfare and their survival.” But fact is, that this is the only way to keep the live stock healthy in the long run. The 49-years old Britain is veterinary in Etosha – a famous national park in the North of Namibia that attracts tourists from all over the world. Founded about a hundred years ago, Etosha belongs to the oldest national parks in the world. But certainly it is not an ideal world: Lions, rhinos, zebras, elephants and giraffes compete with the human beings for land, water and food. Again and again elephants enter the neighbouring farms and destroy parts of the crop; Lions kill the cattle. But on the other hands the herds of cattle contest water and food of the wild animals. Contagious diseases threaten both sides. That for it is extremely important to involve the local resident into the management of the park. Additionally new safe areas are supposed to be formed, so that the wild animals can readopt their primal trails. „Only if the population is willing to help us“, Mark Jago sais, „the protection of the wild animals can be of long continuance. A living rhino has a greater value than a dead one. That has to be clear in people´s mind.“ With twenty other Rangers he fights his way through the brier wood. Time presses: finally they have seen the herd of giraffes, that is supposed to be resettled. Jago changes over to the helicopter. He keeps up radio contact with the group on the ground and then finally he shoots the giraffes with narcotics. Later they expose them in another area of the park. „With this kind of actions we try to obtain the genetic diversity”, Jago explains. „Another reason for trapping the wild animals is research purpose. They get a number, a tattoo and a transceiver. Nature protection means control in every detail. This is the only way to examine ecological coherences and to obtain the variety of species.” Their success proves them right. Concerning the protection of nature and animals, Namibia has a leading role in hole Africa. The population of endangered species like the white rhinoceros is firm for years now. The poaching was contained successfully. The film shows Mark Jago and a group of Rangers in their highly dangerous actions in rough terrain. It also documents the educational work of the gamekeepers: for example with the Himba, the seminomads living in the backcountry of the park and up to the border of Angola. The viewer also meets the San – a small, tough nation of bush-people, that has survived in the deserts and steppes of southern Africa for thousands of years. The heartland of Etosha National Park once was their territory, until the majority of them was banished and put into reservations. Traditionally they were hunter-gatherers. To resettle some of them in Etosha and to see this a an important part of the nature protection, is one of Mark Jago’s Visions. If it comes true in anytime soon?