Introduction
An inaugural class of 40 Maasai students will begin their year-long journey to becoming safari guides in May 2023 at the Wildlife Tourism College of Maasai Mara in the Pardamat Conservation Area (PCA) in the South West of Kenya.
The guide course will teach tracking, wildlife identification, foreign languages and emotional intelligence. Since the COVID Pandemic, there has been a global shortage of accredited safari guides, therefore the construction of the Wildlife Tourism College of Maasai Mara aims to bridge the gap by educating the Maasai people about wildlife, such as on an animal’s pattern of behaviour and migration routes. This will stop wildlife being seen as an external threat to the community and instead foster a mutually beneficial relationship.
The Pardamat Conservation Area
The motivation behind the founding of this college, a decision supported by the Kenyan Wildlife Trust and EDU Africa amongst other conservation and education charities, comes after a continental rise in human-wildlife conflict. The Pardamat Conservation Area (PCA) is the only Maasai conservancy that is triple-use; wildlife, livestock and people all inhabit the area, making the potential for conflict higher than in any other conservancy in Maasai territory.
Ninety percent of the land in the PCA is used for pastoral farming, which has resulted in the fencing off of animals’ traditional migratory routes to individual farming. In turn, the animals are destroying fences and fields to reach water and fresh grazing. Moreover, according to the World Bank, Kenya is ranked 152 out of 181 in the ND-GAIN index (2019), which judges countries’ capacity to deal with climate change, therefore Kenya is extremely vulnerable to the effects of climate change and its wildlife is being pushed further into the lives of the local community in search of food and water.
Benefits of the Construction of the College
The PCA is one of the few conservancies that does not benefit from tourism because there are no safari camps within the area. The construction of the college has brought employment to the conservancy, a trend which will continue as the college has been equipped with a research hub, inviting foreign professors and researchers to share their expertise with the community.
In addition to the economic benefits that the college will bring to the area, the Wildlife Tourism College of Maasai Mara will assist the local community by equipping the Maasai with the tools to interact harmoniously with wildlife and cultivate a peaceful co-existence in the Pardamat Conservation Area.
