National parks in East Africa protect endangered wildlife but sometimes do not support local human populations, according to Edwin Sabuhoro, assistant professor of recreation, park, and tourism management at Penn State. New research by Sabuhoro and two Penn State doctoral students from East Africa demonstrated that poverty and lack of adequate food supply drive most of the poaching and other illegal activities in one such park.

The researchers, led by Gasto Lyakurwa, doctoral student in recreation, park, and tourism, management at Penn State, surveyed 267 household heads in eight villages that border Mkomazi National Park in northern Tanzania. The survey focused on their use of park land and their family’s food security, financial security and educational security to understand which factors led to illegal park use. Their results were published in Conservation.

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