Agricultural Risk Management through Community-Based Wildlife Conservation in Rural Zimbabwe

Abstract

This paper investigates whether the risk faced by rural farmers in Zimbabwe could poten- tially be managed by using community-based wildlife conservation. Community-based wildlife conservation could be an additional asset in the rural farmers investment portfolio thereby potentially diversifying and consequently reducing the risk they face. Such investment could also help e¤orts to conserve wildlife. By making use of national historical data and statistical analysis, this paper nds that community-based wildlife conservation is a feasible hedge asset for agricultural production in rural Zimbabwe. The bene ts of diversi cation into community-based wildlife conservation are likely to be high only in those rural areas that can sustain wildlife pop- ulations su¢cient to generate adequate returns from wildlife activities such as tourism, trophy hunting, live animal sales and meat cropping.