Human-Wildlife Conflict Around Uganda’s Parks: The Crisis and Solutions

The first time I heard about human-wildlife conflict in Uganda, I was sitting in a lodge near Bwindi, still buzzing from a gorilla trek. A staff member told me about his village—about elephants destroying his family’s crops, about nights spent guarding fields, about a neighbor killed by a buffalo.

I didn’t know what to say. I’d flown across the world to see these animals. And here was someone who lived with them every day, sometimes losing everything because of them.

That conversation changed how I think about conservation. Uganda’s national parks aren’t isolated. They’re part of a shared landscape where humans and wildlife are forced to coexist. And coexistence isn’t always peaceful.

The Scale of the Problem

Human-wildlife conflict is a crisis affecting thousands of families every year. The numbers are sobering, and they tell a story of loss that goes far beyond statistics.

In Buliisa District, near Murchison Falls National Park, at least eighteen people have been killed by elephants and buffalo in recent years. Others have been injured, some critically. In February 2025, a fifty-three-year-old woman was killed by an elephant while collecting firewood near her home. Her four-year-old grandson survived but suffered serious injuries to his face, back, and chest.

But death is only part of the story. The real damage is often economic, and it’s devastating for families who live on the edge of survival.

Elephants routinely raid farms, destroying entire harvests overnight. Farmers watch their fields—their livelihoods, their food for the coming year—disappear in a single night. In Kiryandongo District, residents protested after elephants devastated over ten acres of farmland. The affected crops included banana plantations, beans, cassava, maize, rice, and sweet potatoes.

For subsistence farmers, losing that much food isn’t just an inconvenience. It’s a catastrophe. Families go hungry. Children are pulled from school. Debt accumulates. The cycle of poverty deepens.

One village near Queen Elizabeth National Park lost ten families’ primary breadwinners in confrontations with elephants. In retaliation, some community members poisoned the elephants. The cycle of violence continues, leaving both humans and animals dead.

Why It Happens

The causes of human-wildlife conflict are complex, but they boil down to one thing: competition for space and resources.

Uganda’s protected areas are surrounded by growing human populations. More people mean more farmland, more settlements, and more demand for resources like firewood and water. As communities expand, they push closer to park boundaries, increasing encounters with wildlife.

At the same time, wildlife populations have been recovering thanks to conservation efforts. More animals mean more pressure on the limited space inside the parks. Elephants, in particular, need large ranges to find enough food and water. When resources inside parks are scarce, they venture out into nearby villages.

Climate change makes things worse. During dry seasons, wildlife leaves protected areas in search of food and water, often straying into villages and destroying crops.

The problem is that animals don’t understand borders. Parks were created by people, but elephants wander wherever they need to go. In Buliisa, one resident described the situation simply: “Families were breaking up because the heads were spending most of the night time away from home to protect their farms.” People weren’t sleeping. They were standing guard, watching for elephants.

The Crisis of Trust

Beyond the physical danger, there’s a deeper problem: mistrust between communities and conservation authorities.

Many communities feel that conservation authorities have focused on protecting wildlife at the expense of people. They’ve borne the costs of living near parks—the crop raids, the injuries, the deaths—without seeing enough of the benefits.

One community leader put it bluntly: “Our communities have long borne the costs of coexisting with wildlife.” The perception is that conservation benefits flow to tourists, to the government, and to international organizations, but not to the people who actually live with the animals.

This mistrust creates a dangerous cycle. When communities feel abandoned, they’re less likely to support conservation. Some retaliate by poisoning or killing wildlife. Others encroach on park land, seeing no reason to protect something that only brings them harm.

The Revenue Sharing Solution

So what’s being done about it?

One of the most important approaches is revenue sharing. The Uganda Wildlife Authority is required by law to give twenty percent of park entry fees to neighboring communities.

The idea is simple: share the financial benefits of conservation with the people who bear its costs. The funds are distributed through local governments and used for community projects like schools, health centers, and water systems.

The numbers are significant. In the 2024/2025 financial year, the wildlife authority distributed over ten billion shillings to communities around Uganda’s parks. Around Murchison Falls National Park, districts received over three billion shillings. Around Queen Elizabeth, over 1.5 billion shillings.

One visible success is Buliisa Health Centre, a facility funded largely by revenue-sharing money. The officer in charge said, “All these buildings you see are funded by UWA revenue.” The health center serves over a thousand patients monthly, providing care to people who otherwise might have none.

Revenue sharing has also funded schools, hygiene facilities, and livelihood projects. In the 2024/2025 financial year, the wildlife authority monitored 172 community projects with a ninety-nine percent completion rate.

But revenue sharing isn’t perfect. Communities sometimes feel the funds should be distributed differently. In Buliisa, local leaders redirected some funds from livelihood projects toward infrastructure like schools and health centers, which they felt benefited more people.

Physical Barriers: Electric Fencing

Revenue sharing addresses the economic side of the problem. But it doesn’t stop elephants from walking through a village at night.

That’s where electric fencing comes in. The Uganda Wildlife Authority has been investing heavily in solar-powered electric fences to protect communities and wildlife.

The scale is massive. Around Murchison Falls National Park, 81 kilometers of fencing have been installed, with plans to cover the entire 433-kilometer boundary.

The fence has made a difference. One ranger said, “Before we constructed the electric fence, elephants would often destroy gardens and sometimes cause harm to people. Since the fence was installed, conflicts between humans and wildlife have greatly reduced.”

The fencing is expensive—about $6,000 per kilometer. The pilot project around Queen Elizabeth covers 59 kilometers, costing over 1.3 billion shillings. TotalEnergies has also committed to supporting the wildlife authority with an additional ten kilometers of fencing materials.

But progress is slow. One of the biggest challenges is the lack of a clear boundary between the community and the park. Before any fence can be installed, the wildlife authority must first engage communities, negotiate boundaries, and resolve disputes.

In Kidepo Valley National Park, the wildlife authority has begun consultations with leaders from six districts on plans to install a 292-kilometer electric fence. Twenty-seven kilometers have already been completed in Karenga District as a pilot phase.

Nature-Based Solutions: Beekeeping and Beyond

Electric fences aren’t the only answer. Some of the most innovative solutions are low-tech and community-led.

Beekeeping has been one of the most successful approaches. Near Queen Elizabeth National Park, a group of widows received 850 beehives installed along a ten-kilometer stretch of the park boundary.

The hives serve as a natural barrier—elephants are afraid of bees, so they avoid the area. The hives have significantly reduced crop raids. Today, over eighty-three community members produce honey, wax candles, propolis, and even wine, earning an estimated fifteen million shillings annually.

For the widows, the transformation has been life-changing. They’ve gone from fearing elephants to building businesses based on coexistence.

In the Itohya Forest area, a local organization helped communities develop a Conflict Management Strategy based on participatory workshops. The community proposed solutions like beekeeping and Irish potato farming as alternative livelihoods. They also established a Conflict Redress Committee, a formal body to mediate disputes and address grievances.These community-led approaches work because they’re local. The solutions come from the people who live with the problem, not from outsiders.

Addressing Human-Carnivore Conflict

Elephants get a lot of attention, but they’re not the only animals causing conflict. Lions, hyenas, and leopards also attack livestock, and sometimes people.

A recent project is training rangers and community scouts in conflict management, supporting households in conflict hot spots, and building the skills of community-based organizations to advocate for more conservation benefits.

The project is part of a growing recognition that human-carnivore conflict requires dedicated attention. It’s not an afterthought—it’s a priority.

I think about that lodge staff member sometimes. The one who told me about his village, about the elephants, about the nights spent guarding the fields. He wasn’t complaining. He was just explaining his reality.

That’s the thing about human-wildlife conflict. It’s not a problem for the government to solve from above. It’s a lived experience, a daily reality for millions of people.

The solutions that are working—revenue sharing, electric fencing, beekeeping—are the ones that treat local communities as partners, not obstacles. They recognize that conservation can’t succeed by protecting animals in isolation. It has to include the people who live alongside them.

I left Uganda thinking differently about conservation. I still love the animals. But I also understand that the real work happens at the boundary—between the park and the village, between the elephant and the farmer, between hope and despair.That’s where coexistence is built. One health center, one electric fence, one beehive at a time.