Somkhanda Community Game Reserve is a community-owned Big 5 game reserve located in northern Zululand stretching across 12,000 hectares of rolling hills and natural bushland habitat. The reserve is home to breathtaking scenery of both fauna and flora, including 230 bird species and a number of large game species including the Big Five (rhino, elephant, buffalo, lion and leopard). Somkhanda is owned by the Emvokweni Community Trust (ECT), which represents the Gumbi community, and is co-managed by WILDLANDS – a programme of the WILDTRUST. Somkhanda focuses on improving ecosystem management and driving interventions that conserve endangered wildlife and species vulnerable to poaching and the illegal trade. Somkhanda promotes growth for the Gumbi community through ecotourism and environmental education opportunities, currently these initiatives employ around 100 community members.

Somkhanda Community Game Reserve History:

After being forcibly removed from the land in the late 1960s, the Gumbi people had the land restored to them under the Land Reform process in 2005. When the land was restored to the Gumbi people, they decided to keep most of their land under conservation and create a consolidated game reserve that could realise the potential of ecotourism as an economic engine to drive development in the community.

Conservation Highlights:

1. Rhino dehorning
2. Wild dog tracking
3. Lion contraception
4. Vulture conservation
5. The Somkhanda Water Project

Future Aims:

At present, Somkhanda is primarily focused on generating revenue for the Community Game Reserve’s hospitality and tourism endeavours.

Images provided.