Zambia's wildlife govern body has embarked on a process of reorganizing safari hunting in order to do away with irregularities existing in the sector, a senior official said on Tuesday.

Last year, Minister of Tourism and Arts Sylvia Masebo cancelled 19 safari hunting concessions from the period 2013 to 2018. Guy Robinson, the head of the Zambia Wildlife Authority (ZAWA), said guidelines have since been proposed in order to regulate the issuing of special licenses which will soon been announced. In a statement obtained by Xinhua on Tuesday, the official said the wildlife body, with the assistance of the United Nations Development Program (UNDP), has engaged a consultant to prepare a proposal on the roadmap for reorganizing safari hunting in the country.

"Once the study has been approved by my Board, the results of the national wildlife stock census recommendations will be made to the government for relevant policy decisions on the way forward," he said.

According to the official, the study has so far made some dramatic revelations regarding revenue leakages and poor compliance in regard to the generation of revenue from safari hunting for the Zambian economy, which he said has justified government's move to put in place a law to monitor externalization of funds. He said safari hunting will remain suspended in the country until such a time when an aerial survey for national census of wildlife stocks is gathered regarding the wildlife sector in the country.

According to the official, investigations have revealed that a number of irregularities and malpractices have been recorded and gone unpunished in the harvest of underweight ivory, in contradiction to the law.

The law states that the minimum accepted weight for ivory harvest is 15 kilogram per tusk.

"This regulation was heavily abused as tusks weighing as little as 4.5 kilogram were being actively harvested. This was exacerbated by a lack of control and enforcement. However such abuse shall not be tolerated. My Board and Management are taking appropriate measures against such perpetrators," he added. Endi

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