Zakouma National Park is a national park in southeastern Chad, straddling the border of Guéra Region and Salamat Region. Zakouma is the nation's oldest national park, declared a national park in 1963 by presidential decree, giving it the highest form of protection available under the nation's laws. It has been managed by the nonprofit conservation organization African Parks since 2010 in partnership with Chad's government.
History
Zakouma is Chad's oldest national park, established by the nation's government in 1963. Its wildlife have been threatened by the ivory trade and poaching, including by Janjaweed members. In 2007, militia forces attacked the park's headquarters for its stockpile of 1.5 tons of ivory, and killed three rangers. The government of Chad began working with African Parks in 2010 to help manage and protect the park and its wildlife, especially elephants. The park's anti-poaching strategy includes equipping approximately 60 rangers with GPS tracking units and radios to improve communications, mobility, and safety, as well as improving mobility through the use of horses and other vehicles. The European Union pledged €6.9m in 2011 to help protect the park for five years.
Elephant protection efforts expanded outside the park's boundaries in 2012, and an airstrip was constructed in Heban to make monitoring of the migrating animals easier. In August, Heban rangers destroyed a camp belonging to members of the Sudanese army after four elephants were killed. Three weeks later, the poachers attacked the Zakouma outpost at Heban and shot and killed multiple guards. Following the attack, additional bases were built, a second aircraft was purchased, and a rapid response team called the "Mambas" (after the snake of the same name) was formed to enhance security. 23 guards have died protecting Zakouma since 1998, including seven in 2007, four between 2008 and 2010, and six in 2012.
Chadians celebrated the park's fiftieth anniversary in February 2014. Zakouma held a ceremony to commemorate the occasion, which was attended by President Idriss Déby and included a ceremonial destruction of ivory by burning a pyre with a ton elephant tusks to discourage poaching.
African Parks and the Labuschagnes, who served as the park's managers from 2011 to 2017, have been credited with reducing poaching and increasing Zakouma's elephant population. African Parks took over management of ecologically valuable lands surrounding Zakouma, including the Siniaka-Minia Faunal Reserve and Bahr Salamat Faunal Reserve, in 2017.
Flora and fauna
Zakouma National Park is part of the Sudano-Sahelian vegetation zone, and has shrubland, high grasses, and Acacia forests. Plants recorded in the park include Combretaceae and Vachellia seyal (red acacia).
A variety of large mammals have been recorded in Zakouma, such as buffalo, elephant, Kordofan giraffe, hartebeest, leopard, and lion. In 2016, The Independent said there were increases to the park's buffalo, giraffe, and lion populations in recent years. The Times reported the presence of thousands of buffalo, more than 130 lions, and an unknown number of leopards, as well as plans to reintroduce black rhinoceros. It's estimated that 60% of the 2,300 Kordofan giraffe remaining on Earth are living in Zakouma National Park.
During a study of the park's terrestrial small mammals, nine rodent and two shrew species were recorded. Rodents included the African grass rat, Congo gerbil, Guinea multimammate mouse, Heuglin's striped grass mouse, Johan's spiny mouse, Kemp's gerbil, Matthey's mouse, striped ground squirrel (Xerus erythropus), and Verheyen's multimammate mouse. The shrew species reported in the study were the savanna shrew and another belonging to the genus Suncus.
Birds include ostriches, cranes, eagles, egrets, herons, ibis, pelicans, and storks.