Wildlife tourism in Africa bracing for Covid-19 impact

An elephant playing with her keeper at Reteti Elephant Sanctuary in Namunyak Wildlife Conservancy, Kenya, in February. Conservation parks in South Africa rely heavily on tourism to operate, but with the Covid-19 pandemic bringing travel to a halt, these sanctuaries are in trouble. — AFP

The orphaned baby elephants ambled in for their morning feed at Kenya’s Sheldrick Wildlife Trust, but the hundreds of visitors who would normally be waiting to watch them were absent. So were their dollars.

As airports and borders closed to stop the spread of the novel coronavirus, Africa’s wildlife tourism sector evaporated, along with revenues many conservation projects rely on to protect some of the continent’s most endangered animals.