Poaching in Uganda: Perspectives of Law Enforcement Rangers

Abstract

Much of prior empirical research examining poachers and poaching strategies have originated from interviews with poachers and wildlife law enforcement officers within North American settings. Few studies have empirically analyzed poacher categories and poaching strategies within an African context. Furthermore, most studies have overlooked important situational elements that influence poacher activities. Based on semi-structured interviews and informal conversations with law enforcement rangers and supervisors and, participant observations of routine day foot patrols, this study presents the findings of an exploratory analysis on poaching in a protected area in Uganda.

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

The authors would like to acknowledge the Uganda Wildlife Authority, the management of Queen Elizabeth National Park, and the Uganda National Council for Science and Technology for enabling the present study to be completed. The authors would also like to thank the anonymous reviewers and the editor for their helpful comments. Finally, the authors are grateful to the study participants for their involvement, candor, and insight.

Notes

¹ Although poaching can involve both fauna and flora, we limit our discussion to the poaching of fauna species.

² Recently, Moreto and Lemieux (2014) extended the CRAVED model and developed CAPTURED (Concealable, Available, Processable, Transferable, Usable, Removable, Enjoyable, and Desirable) to further highlight the value of a product-based assessment of the illegal wildlife market.

³ Of the 20 participants originally selected, one was unavailable due to injury and another potential respondent was selected and asked to participate.

⁴ Notably, in some cases where a scheduled patrol involved a respondent, the lead author would conduct the interview immediately after the patrol.

⁵ Average age of respondents was 35.

⁶ Study participants were not included in any of the photographs in order to ensure anonymity.

⁷ Authors’ note: As mentioned, we believe that our informal interactions with rangers throughout our time in the study area yielded invaluable information that otherwise may have not been obtained. In total, we spent approximately 1000 hours engaged in informal participant observations whereby we conversed, dined, and engaged in other activities with rangers.

⁸ The authors originally performed a manual analysis and hand-coding of the interviews. By hand-coding the interviews, the authors were able to identify preliminary organizational categories useful for guiding subsequent the subsequent analysis in NVivo 10.

⁹ Poisoning is also used by villagers in retaliation against elephants after their crops have been raided.

¹⁰ The use of poison was also identified as a means for retaliatory killings as a result of human-elephant conflict.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

William D. Moreto

WILLIAM D. MORETO is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Criminal Justice at the University of Central Florida and is a Visiting Scholar at the Netherlands Institute for the Study of Crime and Law Enforcement. His research interests include environmental criminology and crime science, crime prevention, GIS and spatiotemporal crime analysis, wildlife crime, and policing. His work has appeared in Justice Quarterly, the British Journal of Criminology, European Journal on Criminal Policy and Research, and Oryx: The International Journal of Conservation.

A. M. Lemieux

A. M. LEMIEUX is a Researcher at the Netherlands Institute for the Study of Crime and Law Enforcement. His main areas of interest are the spatial and temporal distribution of crime, the use of technology to improve law enforcement operations, and anti-poaching operations in Africa.