Connected Conservation

Why Connected Conservation makes sense 

Sabi Sand, a game reserve adjacent to the Kruger National Park wanted more effective means to prevent rhino poaching and, thereby, conserve the rhino for future generations. We harnessed the power of technology to protect the rhino by tracking the movement of people.

South Africa is home to 80% of the world’s remaining rhinos. With populations decimated by poaching, there’s a real chance the rhino could be extinct by 2025. A private game reserve took the lead in finding a technology-based way to deter poachers.

Every day, hundreds of staff, suppliers, contractors, security personnel and tourists enter and exit the reserve. Being in such a remote location, activity wasn’t monitored. Only basic technology infrastructure and access control, manual security processes, and very limited communication existed.

An end-to-end solution was introduced, proactively stopping people entering the reserve illegally. If an incursion took place, the solution triggered an alarm in the control center. An alert with exact coordinates for the incursion was sent to armed rangers’ mobile devices, who patrol both on the ground and in a helicopter.

NTT's engineers have since developed wildlife detection algorithms and a pipeline to process satellite imagery and deliver results, so that field teams can review outputs.

What connected conservation technology achieves

Innovative application of IT infrastructure, Managed Services, data analytics, multiscreen communication, secure network and data flow, a point to point reserve network, CCTV cameras, and biometric scanning helped conservation management teams reduce incursions into the reserve by 96% in the first 18 months of our pilot project. 

Before the Connected Conservation pilot project was implemented in 2016, the nature reserve lost rhinos to poaching at a rate of one per week.  

The Connected Conservation Foundation's solution nullified the risk. It provided real-time intelligence to enable preventative action against poachers. 

Poaching in the reserve dropped by 96% in its first year. And, in 2017 and 2018, there were zero rhinos poaches. 

In 2020, stemming from this success, the nonprofit Connected Conservation Foundation (CCF) was born. CCF enables increased collaboration and support from more partners to scale up technology for conservation impacts.

Our impact:

• Together, we’re helping safeguard 5,000,000 hectares of wild ecosystems, home to the black and white rhino. With our partners, we've supported the Connected Conservation Foundation in installing Reserve Area Networks across Sabi Sand Nature Reserve, Lewa Wildlife Conservancy, Great Fish River Nature Reserve and six new conservancies with Northern Rangelands Trust.
• This year alone, 12 poaching incursions into Sabi Sand Nature Reserve have been thwarted with the help of connected conservation solutions. If each incursion potentially equals a rhino's death, that's at least 12 rhinos saved from harm.
• High-res wildlife monitoring PTZ cameras are delivering live stream videos from five remote watering holes to monitor rhino health for the Northern Rangelands Trust (NRT). Dimension Data Kenya (part of NTT) helped install and connect these live streams, providing live video footage of rhinos visiting watering holes in Sera Wildlife Conservancy. This enables rangers to make quicker rhino health and weight observations, better informing their decision-making on food and water interventions during unprecedented, challenging times. Due to successful wildlife recovery and conservation efforts run by the Sera community, the population of black rhinos is recovering here. In 2015, ten rhinos were reintroduced into the conservancy, and within six years, the number doubled to twenty. Thanks to the determination and efforts of the community, rangers and partners, no poaching has been reported.
• Only 43% of rangers worldwide have access to a communications device on patrol. Thanks to NTT and Cisco, the Connected Conservation Foundation has equipped over 100 rangers across partner conservancies, with connectivity and communication devices. These allow rangers to communicate with their control room at all times, so they can request help and give an immediate warning of potentially harmful activity to rhinos or themselves.