Africa has become a byword for poverty and conflict and the graveyard for well meaning development projects. But its also known for its spectacular and diverse animal and plant life.

This great 'living' resource is vanishing just as fast as Africa's human cargo of desperately poor people is increasing. On this continent, poverty threatens nature every bit as much as wealth.

In this week's Earth Report we visit two hotspots for wildlife diversity - the Republic of Congo and Kenya, to find out why this natural wealth is being destroyed. But we also see how even the most disadvantaged communities can develop the means to make wildlife pay its way.

Biting the Hand the Feeds Us

If nature disappears, humankind, nature's biggest predator, will also disappear.

Little more than ten years ago the Republic of Congo, in South West Africa, was cloaked in forests. But satellite imagery and environmental assessments indicate that the outlook for the forests and the wildlife they support - chimps, forest elephants included - is bleak.

Denis Sassou-Nguesso, the country's President does not agree. "We protect the forest, we work the forest, we replant and create protected areas.

We're moving towards development for villages and those living around protected areas and we are developing ecotourism. It's a whole programme."

Sustainable development and conservation are concepts that are relatively new in the Republic of Congo. The government is riding on a wave of new political initiatives, particularly when it comes to the use of the forests, which are the country's second source of export revenue after oil.

Forest covers two-thirds of the country and it forms part of the Congo Basin rainforest - the second largest in the world after the Amazon.

Day by the day the timber trade grows. The Republic of Congo and other Central African countries are faced with the growing challenge to strike a balance between exploiting and protecting their natural resources.

Predators in the Park

600 kilometres to the west of the capital Brazzaville, on the edge of the Congo Basin forest, lies the Conkouati-Douli National Park. Established by the Congolese government in 1999, the park covers an area of over 5000 square kilometres.

Since the summer of 2004 Conkouati has been run by the World Conservation Society which has headquarters in New York.

Hilda Vanleeuwe, World Conservation Society: "Conkouati is a so-called national park but if you look at national park status at an international level it doesn't comply with it. We want this park to become a national park and it's not the case for the moment."

The park lies 180 kilometres from the port of Pointe Noire, Congo's second largest city. It is a haven for African wildlife, but also a focal point for those making a living from the illegal trade in wild animals. And in this part of the world, bushmeat is the protein of choice.

Hilda Vanleeuwe, World Conservation Society: "Pointe-Noire has a million people, so if everybody eats one gram of bushmeat everyday that's a million grams of bushmeat that comes from the park. From nowhere else because they emptied everything around there. So... it's not sustainable."

Not only does the park face pressure from the inhabitants of Pointe Noire - there are also several communities located within its boundaries.

Traditionally they've depended on the forest for their livelihood. But they told us that they are not benefiting from conservation.

Anselme Taty, Ngoma villager: "Beforehand, in 1972 and other years, the village was lively, everyone was happy somehow.

And now, since the park was set up, hunting, fishing and picking fruit have been forbidden.

So people aren't very happy. Well, they are not happy at all and they don't live off what they used to live off."

"It's forbidden for us to fish, hunt, pick fruit...everything...the park promised to set up alternative activities."

The villagers told us that these alternative means of livelihood have not been provided. And they are getting angry.

Joseph Makaya Ngoma Village Chief: "We want the park to be transferred 40 or 50 kilometres away, or even 200-300 kilometres away. We are not against the park. Why would we be?

We want them to let us be free. To let us be free."

Free, but at what price? some locals recognize the price they may pay...

Anselme Taty: "If nature disappears, mankind will disappear. Man... nature's biggest predator, will also disappear."

Philémon Mingonga, Conkouati National Park: "Conservation is a recent concept. People don't understand conservation very well."

With no viable economic alternatives for the local population - the fear is that the subsistence hunters will openly join the illegal bushmeat trade. In this part of Africa bushmeat is the favourite item on the menu. If poaching takes off, the wildlife in Conkouati's 5000 square kilometres will not last long. The park has only three official Congolese government employees and a team of 20 'ecoguards', paid for by the World Conservation Society.

Philémon Mingonga: "What I want to ask from the government is... their support, we need them to give us the necessary means to fight poaching."

"The State must support us and give us the necessary means to carry out our surveillance activities."

Hunter is Hunted

On a daily basis the guards say they find bushmeat and protected species - like live crocodiles - on the vehicles which transport people from the villages in Conkouati to Pointe Noire.

Hilda Vanleeuwe "We've even found live crocodiles which have lost their legs, they got gangrene because they were tied up for so long."

"You see it is trying to move but it can't use its front legs properly yet."

"It is transported alive because the meat is then fresher. They take it to the market in Pointe Noire and when we search the vehicle - there's always something onboard. At New Year we seized 23, crocodiles on the vehicle and 69 other dead animals."

Helping Hand for the Chimps

In 1991 Aliette Jamart - a French national - set up the HELP Chimpanzee Sanctuary on the edge of the Conkouati Lagoon.

Driven by the large numbers of chimpanzees being captured by poachers and being held in captivity, she set out to prove - against all the specialist advice at the time - that it was possible to reintroduce the primates back into the wild.

A team of volunteers and local Congolese employees help look after the chimps - at first feeding them daily, then gradually reducing the human contact until they're ready to return to the wild.

Over the years Aliette has managed to release 35 chimpanzees into the heart of the Conkouati forest, a dozen more are being habituated on two islands in the lagoon.

Her work has met with a lot of resistance from the local population.

Aliette Jamart, HELP Sanctuary: "When we arrived here, people were convinced it wouldn't last. They've always seen people come. But after a year or two, they left."

Now I think they're surprised, because I am still here, in spite of all the harassment.

Some local people told us they thought the chimpanzees were being better treated than themselves.

Aliette rescued Gina from zoo in Pointe Noire in 1992. Gina had a baby but poachers grabbed it. This is a traumatised chimp - she's now so used to humans that it's unlikely she'll ever be able to adapt to the wild.

Aliette Jamart "She had a baby. The first one died and the second one was stolen from her. She was a year and a half. The baby was taken from her. And since then, she's not doing well."

Despite the setbacks, in the years since the sanctuary was established the Congolese employees working for Aliette believe attitudes have changed in the area. Felix Batissa came from Pointe Noire in 2001 to work for HELP.

Félix Batissa, HELP Sanctuary: "Beforehand people used to think that chimpanzees, elephants, buffalos, etc., were meat, food for them to eat. Then a while after Madame Jamart arrived they learned that chimpanzees were not to be eaten."

Today Aliette has all but stopped taking in new chimpanzees, arguing that there is a limit to the numbers that can be sustainably released into any one part of the forest.

She's also aware that with no economic alternatives and a strong demand among Africans for bushmeat, even a fully habituated chimpanzee is likely to fall victim to a poacher. The survival of the wildlife will depend on tough conservation measures.

Aliette Jamart: "Conservation is like having an injection. An injection hurts, but you get over it."

The healing process is set to be long. The Congolese government and its African counterparts have yet to come up with a cure which would provide the right balance between sustainable development and conservation.

Henri Djombo, Forest and Environment Minister, Republic of Congo: "The kind of cooperation must be changed. Because today the trend is conditional aid, that means that credits are given but they're used to finance experts from donor countries, material from donor countries, with very little local added value, with very little local pay-back, and often local populations are excluded. They always end up rebelling and becoming opponents of conservation."

The Congolese government and other African governments, are at the start of a long process and have a long way to go before they can bring about this change.

Too Many Elephants

The Shimba Hills are close to the great sea port of Mombasa, in Kenya. Soon after European colonists arrived just over a century ago, the hills received a measure of protection.

In 1968 the newly independent Kenyan government made the area into a National Reserve. Today it's home to the last sable antelopes in Kenya. Elephants, whose local survival was seriously jeopardized when the reserve was created, have recovered to the point where they're becoming a pest.

Moses Litotoh works for the Kenya Wildlife Service. "Well, it's a good habitat for them. There's good food, there's water, and there's security for them as well."

"Well, we have some 700 elephants in this area. That's too much. We have an area of about 250 square kilometres. That is a very high density."

According to Kenya Wildlife Service experts, in order to maintain the balance between nature and wildlife, there needs to be at least one square kilometre per elephant.

On this estimate, 700 elephants are too many for the 250 sq km Shimba Hills Reserve. And too many tuskers are causing problems...

Morris Leli Kazungu is a local farmer. "The worst animals are elephants. These animals have actually led us to problems for many years. They come, especially when you plant maize, plant the cassava, you plant banana trees, they come, they remove them. They spoil them up to everything."

"They have removed all the my maize crops. I've nothing to eat."

"Now, when you go there to try to chase them, they want to follow you up. Now, will you compete with an elephant? You run away. You lock yourself in the houses. I was told by animals 'Move!'."

Moses Litoroh: "Elephants are very destructive animals. They kill people, they injure many people. So for the elephants to live with people, it becomes very tricky."

So then, to mitigate that, there's need for people living in those areas to benefit from the elephant. When the people see that they are benefiting from the elephant conservation, then they will like to conserve elephants. And that is the only way I can see that elephants can cohabit with the people. Only if there is a financial benefit agreeing with that."

In 1993, a group of farmers living alongside the reserve decided that the best policy was in effect 'if you can't beat them, join them'. So they pooled their lands to create the Mwaluganje Elephant Sanctuary.

Chatsi Mwachatsi is one of the 150 smallholders who benefits more from the reserve than from his small farm.

"After the elephants became too numerous on our farms, we decided to come together in a union and to voluntarily give out our land for the benefit of the elephants and for our own benefit. Now we can plant our crops and also get some cash from the sanctuary."

Juma Ali Mwadudu, Mwaluganje Elephant Sanctuary: "We were not paid out to leave, but we left voluntarily to create that business as a way of solving the human-elephant conflict. Our sanctuary is private, community land, managed by the community. We put business first, conservation second. But I said without the conservation business does not come in, because it's conservation business. So we have to conserve to sustain the business."

The sanctuary is viable because its bang next to the reserve meaning the tourists will come to the sanctuary with hard currency to spend.

Jonathan Kirui, Shimba Hills National Reserve: "Visitors come here. We have tourist resorts around. People get employment and of course the direct benefit of supplying food to those hotels for the visitors, and selling other goods to to the industry."

The Elephant Sanctuary boasts a hotel and a restaurant, and guided tours are on offer to tourists. Twenty people are working there full-time, plus around 100 other part-time employees.

The Elephant Sanctuary boasts a hotel and a restaurant, and guided tours are on offer to tourists. Twenty people are working there full-time, plus around 100 other part-time employees. With an average 6,000 visitors every year, the Sanctuary generates an annual revenue of some 65,000 USD.

Juma Mwadudu: "We'd like to show our shareholders that conservation should continue, we have been trying to share out all what we collect, but the majority are poor people and more of our income, you know, goes into the stomach. Yes. We work for food. We know they're poor members, so we're able to advance them some money, and they pay slowly through their shares to enable them to take their children to school."

In the Republic of Congo, we saw how the wildlife in the protected area was at risk from hunters who have decimated the wildlife outside. Here in Kenya, despite a much denser human population, the residents of the Shimba Hills have seen that the animals can provide more than meat.

The Grass is Always Greener...

So the 120-kilometre electric fence which has been put up all around the reserve and the sanctuary, is a price people think is worth paying to protect them from elephants.

Jonathan Kirui, Senior Warden, Shimba Hills National Reserve: "This fence is meant to protect the farmland from the animals, especially the elephants. It's also for the security of the people out there."

But elephants have huge appetites and maize is a particular pachyderm delicacy...

Juma Ali "We got an opportunity to learn about elephants. So we realised they preferred maize because they're a bit soft, and it's a delicacy to them."

With an average 6,000 visitors every year, the Sanctuary generates an annual revenue of some US$65,000.

Patrick Kyalo, Farmer "It took some time before the elephants started breaking the fence."

"But when they were confined to the park, the elephants decided to come and see what the fence was made of."

"And they decided to use their tusks, which cannot be electrocuted."

"They also turn their backs to the fence and kick the poles to break them."

Jonathan Kirui, Senior Warden, Shimba Hills National Reserve: "Part of the fence is about 40 kilometres that was broken down, and we are now in the process of trying to rehabilitate. As you can see, there are people on the land, trying to rectify the fence."

Every 10 kilometres, a small solar panel supplies power to the fence.

Morris Leli Kazungu, Farmer "I think the solution is put an electric fence here, not this one. We normally, they use solar systems. Solar systems have very few currents. But I think electricity will do better. Not these solar ones."

Chema Musya is in charge of the maintenance and running of one of these fence sections. Every afternoon at 4 o'clock he switches on the power...

Chema Musya, Kenya Wildlife Service employee "I put it off so that I can maintain the wires."

"It is supposed to function 24 hours a day, but because of the maintenance, since it's electric, it can give you a shock when you touch it, so I have to put it off so that I can walk around the fence, and make sure that everything is OK before I put it on again."

Low voltage and daily power cuts conspire to make the fence less than a formidable obstacle for the elephants who roamed here long before humans arrived. One solution would be to connect the fence to the national power grid but who'd put up the money for such an expenditure?"

Jonathan Kirui, Senior Warden, Shimba Hills National Reserve: "From the government yes. But as you may realise, even the government also relies on donors for support. So, yes, they do provide us the little that they also get, but it's not adequate to maintain the fence."

"What we are trying to encourage the people is that, instead of putting food crops right up to the fence, they should rather have maybe trees, so that it sort of provides a visual barrier from the elephants."

Lead Us Not Into Temptation

Some farmers have already started planting trees along the fence and they've found the move has other benefits than just protecting their crops...

Patrick Kyalo, Farmer: "The reason we are planting trees is to block the view of the animals into our farms."

"When there was only the fence, when the animals came near the fence, they would see our farms and plants, so they would break the fence, and come and destroy our crops, so we decided to plant trees."

"Apart from preventing the elephants from seeing our farms, we're planting the trees as an investment for the future, to provide timber, and firewood."

"And if we take it to a market, we will sell it, so we'll be improving our standard of living with the money we get from the trees."

Do the elephants, sable antelope and other residents of one of Africa's rapidly vanishing hotspots of diversity have a future? Perhaps, because in Kenya unlike the Republic of Congo the tourist sector is far more developed.

In Africa the constant excuse for the destruction of nature is that poor people can't be expected to think about tomorrow.

Shimba shows otherwise and in the course of establishing the sanctuary the local population will benefit from the watershed in biodiversity protection.