Operation

Park Operation

Park History

The Simien Mountains National Park (SMNP) is found North West of the country, in Amhara Regional State, at about 885 km from Addis Ababa. It is located at geographical coordinates of 13o9’North and 38o15’East. The SMNP, after being recommended by the UNESCO mission in 1965, was formally established by 1966 and gazetted in 1969 following the gazetment of the Awash National Park. At the time of the establishment and gazetment the area of the national park was about 136 sq. km.

Since the boundary demarcation and establishment was done without the involvement and active participation of the local communities inhabiting both inside and border of the park, it had been not recognized and respected by the communities as a result of which a mass loss of the natural resources of the park had been happening in the past 35 years since its establishment.

However, a re-demarcation was made at present with full participation of all the stakeholders including community representatives and the area of the national park is increased to 232.5 km.sq. The park was previously established with the objective of conserving the rare and endemic Walia ibex (Capra walie). In addition to this and the presence of unique landscape and the rich biodiversity resources, the park was inscribed on the list of World Natural Heritage Site by UNESCO in 1978.

Organization

Until 1996 the park was administered by the former Ethiopian Wildlife Conservation Organization. Latter on, following the formation of Regional States, the SMNP was administered under the Agricultural Bureau of Amhara Regional State. The fact that the administration of the national park was fallen under the regional Agricultural Bureau, inevitably, had led to further deterioration and unprecedented destruction of the natural resources of the park. The reason for to that level of alarming loss of biodiversity was that the bureau hadn’t given a due consideration to this sector as much as for that of the agricultural sector. In addition, there was no department responsible to follow up the park management activities and take corrective measures. As a result, the national park was listed as one of the endangered world heritage sites by UNESCO in 1996. It was during that then regional state government recognized what was happening to the natural resources of national park and realized that there was a need to setup a committee at a regional level that overtook the management of the park. The committee had been chaired by the vice president of the region. Though the efforts had been made by the committee to manage the park was highly appreciated, it had not been possible to significantly reduce the human-induced threats posed on the resources of park. Therefore, the Amhara Regional State believed the importance of establishing a self Autonomous body to manage and administer the park. Following the consensus of the regional parliament, the ‘’Parks Development and Protection Authority’’ was established in 2003 by the proclamation No. 96/2003. The authority is accountable to Culture and Tourism Bureau of the Region and Park management board

Park Office

The SMNP office is accountable to the Parks Development and Protection Authority and is the overall implementing agent of the Authority at the national park. Including the warden the park office has 7 professionals and semi-professionals as well as 59 scouts and guards. This implies that there is 1 scout per 4 km2. In order to effectively and efficiently perform its resource protection activities there are 10 functional out posts at different sites of the national park. The outposts are assigned with game scouts and guards, and are well provided with communication radio, heater, binocular and other necessary equipments. Of the total annual budget allocated to the Authority, 40 percent goes to the park office, which on the average Birr 626,000 per year. Additionally the park office gets about Birr 400,000 annually from the Simien mountains Integrated Development Project (IDP) which is funded by the Austrian Government. The project supports the park in the following 4 programs.

• Park capacity building
• Tourism Development
• Natural Resource Management
• Community development

This project was initially designed and had been implemented with the project office staff with out the participation of the park office and relevant wereda stakeholders. However, after the evaluation of the project implementation, two years latter, it was thought that there were some pitfalls in achieving the desired targets. As a result, a new approach was devised to facilitate the implementation of the project activities. In this approach the intervention of the project office is restricted to financial and technical support. This work adjustment has resulted in better implementation of the project activities in the management and development of the national park.