Wildlife poachers in Kenya are on the run as eyes in the sky now track their nefarious activities, leaving fewer places to hide. The successful completion, at the end of August this year, of a pilot project featuring remote controlled drones using aerial surveillance to monitor poaching activities has given hope to conservation efforts.

The potential of the project, which began in late 2014, has prompted the country to roll out this campaign to all 52 of its registered parks and conservancies in January 2017. The pilot project took place in the Tsavo National Park, Kenya's largest national park and home to about 25 percent of the country's elephant population.

The park (which has east and west sections) covers almost 22,000 square km, almost the size of Djibouti, and is currently home to more than 8,000 elephants. According to Kenya Wildlife Service (KWS), a reduction in elephant poaching in the park since December 2014 resulted in an increase of 3,323 in the elephant population (at the time of writing).

Records from KWS show that between 2012 and most of 2014, Kenya lost more than 440 elephants and 400 rhinos to poaching per year, coupled with increasing corruption among law enforcement agencies.

Drones effective

Paul Udoto, who heads up communications at the KWS, told ChinAfrica that the initiative in Tsavo National Park has been inspiring and was the main reason for a reduction of poaching in the park. He said that rangers in the country's other parks are currently being trained on how to use remote controlled drones.

"Kenya Wildlife Service currently has a total of 1,600 rangers, 600 of whom are community rangers who work outside wildlife protected areas. The use of remote controlled drones is very easy. You can even use one yourself without much training by just using Android applications that can be downloaded on your smartphone or tablet," explained Udoto.

He said that a certain level of skill was still required to operate a drone efficiently. "[Through the use of drones] poaching in Tsavo [National Park] has gone down by 80 percent since January last year [to date]. We have also used the much larger drones, some supplied by the Chinese and U.S. governments, as part of our studies on their viability," said Udoto.

Drones are unmanned aerial flights used for many purposes. They use radio frequencies to monitor the landscape and movement of the animals. "We use aerial surveillance to monitor poaching activities," he added.

In Kenya drones can only be used by the military, police and wildlife rangers and are not permitted for use by civilians for security reasons.

In addition to the drone project, anti-poaching efforts have also successfully utilized technology in some smaller parks in the form of an SMS warning signal, which has contributed to a drop in poaching in the last two years.

"The SMS alerts rangers on possible poaching by use of a text message. This happens when an animal interferes with a fence or somebody tries to put it down. The alarm produces a very loud annoying sound, which is then relayed to a security switchboard. The SMS shows the location [of the incident and] reinforcements are then dispatched to the affected area immediately," ecologist and conservationist Paula Kahumbu told ChinAfrica.

Kahumba said that another issue that may have discouraged poachers could be Kenyan President Uhuru Kenyatta burning 105 tons of ivory in the Nairobi National Park in April this year.

Iconic conservationist and founder of the government operated KWS, Richard Leakey, expects elephant and rhino poaching incidents to continue falling in coming months.

"I do expect drones will reduce poaching. It is working in other countries, such as India, where it is monitoring illegal logging. Drones are also helping in parts of Russia, Siberia specifically, to monitor poaching of the Siberian tigers and polar bears. I do have a lot of confidence. Lion numbers continue to rise but we still have concerns with predatory birds, as their food chain continues to be interrupted by human activities," said Leakey.

Internal challenges

One area of concern in the anti-poaching efforts has been the alleged backlog of apprehended poachers awaiting convictions.

According to Keriako Tobiko, Director of Public Prosecutions of Kenya, there are many pending cases related to poaching in Kenyan courts awaiting convictions. He admits that this is because of inadequate investigation by the Kenyan police, as well as high rates of bribery.

"As a prosecutor, I always do my best, but in many incidences, the evidence [is] easily interfered with before or when it arrives in the courts. Police are usually bribed or the suspects influence the judges as they have money. But usually poachers [who] kill animals are middlemen. They are paid by someone wealthy and influential to perform the task. But we hope for more convictions with the ongoing cases [in] which we have compiled strong evidence," Tobiko told ChinAfrica.

Charles Owino, Kenya's police spokesperson, told

ChinAfrica that some 24 policemen have been convicted and jailed for various charges of corruption involving wildlife trafficking and poaching this year. Another 12 are facing prosecution and their cases are yet to be determined.

Project funding

Kenya's anti-poaching drone project will cost $100 million according to the country's Cabinet Secretary of Foreign Affairs, Amina Mohammed.

"China is funding at least 35 percent of the program, I can confirm to you," she told ChinAfrica, adding that the monetary funds are jointly provided by the United States, Canada and Denmark, with China's funding contribution being the supply of the drones.

Wildlife campaigners have been vocal about the contributions China is making in the anti-poaching efforts in Kenya. Peter Knights, Executive Director of WildAid told Xinhua News Agency earlier this year that there is no doubt China has contributed immensely to the war against poaching in Kenya and the region.

"The country has provided funds, vehicles and state-of-the-art equipment to the wildlife agency to help monitor and arrest criminal syndicates involved in this vice," he said.

"Our influential partners in China have also supported anti-poaching initiatives in Kenya and the entire region," Daudi Sumba, a senior official at the African Wildlife Foundation told Xinhua.

As a country committed to leading the way in ivory trade issues, Kenya recently declared at the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (CITES) held in South Africa in October that it will ban trade of its remaining ivory stockpiles and called for a global ban of ivory trade. 27 countries supported Kenya's decision during the 17th CITES meeting. CA

(Reporting from Kenya)