Recent media coverage has focused on Namibia’s drought and the associated wildlife management measures, leading to concerns about the impact on the country’s conservation efforts. Sustainable conservation strategies aim to protect entire ecosystems – natural systems that far surpass anything created by humans in age and complexity. Managing these systems is a daunting task that requires a holistic approach, focusing on maintaining the integrity of the entire ecosystem rather than preserving individual species in isolation. Artificial interventions, like increasing water availability and habitat fragmentation, have led to certain species, reaching unnaturally high population levels. Elephants, as keystone species and ecosystem engineers, can pose risks to other species and the overall balance of the ecosystem when their numbers become unsustainable. In this context, removing 83 elephants from an estimated population of 24,000 (according to the latest data from the Ministry of Environment, Forestry, and Tourism) will not negatively affect a population that has steadily grown over the last 50 years.

Africa remains the only continent where large mammals like elephants persist in healthy numbers, while they were lost from other parts of the world long ago. Effective conservation requires managing these species on a vast spatial scale, ensuring that their survival provides real benefits to local communities, such as income from tourism and sustainable resource use. Similar practices, like large-scale management of deer and wild boar populations in Europe, are common around the world, but they are particularly critical in Africa due to the vast areas required to support such large species and the lack of alternative economic opportunities. We call on the global community to recognize and support Namibia’s conservation achievements and not to undermine necessary management decisions that are essential to ensuring the long-term stability and survival of our ecosystems.