Last month I warned you that
Mozambique was planning a trophy fee hike for 2012. The initial proposal was to raise the fees by as much as 300 percent in some cases. Thankfully, the Association of Mozambique Operators (AMOS) was able to get authorities to back away from an increase on the eve of the conventions and to rethink the amount of those increases. A final decision won't be issued until later this year, but increases are more likely to be around 50 percent and implemented over a period of several years. Some trophy fees will be a higher percentage increase than others. Lion, elephant and leopard are definitely going up. Keep this in mind if you want to book a hunt for 2013 and beyond. As soon as the new fees are finalized I will pass on the information.
Continuing in Mozambique, I spoke with Edward Rosenfels of
Western Safaris (
info@westernsafaris.co.za) at
The African Hunting Show in Toronto about some interesting work he is doing there. If Rosenfels' name and company sound familiar it's because his father has run Western Safaris in Zimbabwe since 1979. Rosenfels told me about a partnership Western Safaris has forged with Barrie Duckworth of
Mokore Safaris (
mokore@mweb.co.zw;) to create the Rio SAVE Safaris syndicate. Together they've worked out a unique deal with the Mozambique government and the villagers of Coutada 9. The deal involved creating a Campfire-type program in which Coutada 9 (220,000 hectares) was rezoned into three areas. The core area is for conservation only. No agriculture or settlements are allowed in the core area. That core is surrounded by a campfire-type zone, which is managed by the villagers.....
