This is a timely, valuable and highly readable book that comes at a time of heightened public interest in environmental issues. It provides an engaging and immersive description of the (largely unsuccessful) history of wildlife management in Central Africa, and the persistent challenges in Congo Basin countries. These challenges have only grown over time despite efforts to halt what appears at times to be an unstoppable, headlong rush towards a future in which the region’s great forests will be left ‘empty’ of their rich wildlife. Much of the value of the book lies in the author’s commitment to viewing the issues from a human perspective – that is, through the eyes of the people who live closest to animals, hunt them, trade them and consume their meat.
At the outset, the author introduces some of the developments that have contributed to rising pressure on wildlife and the boom in urban bushmeat consumption, which include population growth, the expansion of urban areas, and deforestation stemming from agriculture and resource exploitation. Importantly, it is made clear that bushmeat is not a subsistence food eaten out of necessity due to a lack of better options; rather, to some, it is ‘everything: it’s money and food, [and] it’s what makes [people] feel good’ (p. 1). It is a delicacy and essential component of regional identity. As a means of connection between urban consumers and their rural kin, culture and ancestral home, bushmeat’s social value is of great importance. For many Congolese, bushmeat is frequently the centrepiece on urban tables at weekend gatherings, and it is served to guests to show respect, gratitude and acknowledgement (p. 95).
Given his intended audience, the author does well to engage with the literature from a range of areas, including livelihoods, food security, wildlife management, zoonosis, bushmeat economies and consumption trends, while maintaining readability for non-experts. Primary ethnographic data is used to bring forth local perspectives throughout the book, ensuring that the priorities of local people are put at the centre of the discussion. The book will certainly be of benefit to professionals working in related fields, including rural and urban development, public health, conservation and environmental protection, who seek to view the issue of bushmeat from outside their own disciplines.
By presenting the perspectives of the actors involved in the supply and consumption of bushmeat, the author is able to penetrate the ideological divides between often conflicting development and conservation agendas. Trefon illuminates the realities of how bushmeat has featured, currently features, and is likely to continue to feature in the lives of hunters, traders, caterers, law enforcement agents, policymakers, conservationists and consumers. He is also able to show – through detailed explorations of each of these groups – that no single stakeholder group is a monolith, and that there is often stark variation within each category. This allows for a more realistic and practical examination of how future policy may be formulated not only to fulfil a particular ideological priority, but also to satisfy the real-life considerations and challenges that determine whether actors are able to comply with legislation and guidelines aimed at changing their behaviour.
Trefon warns that the implications for human well-being and the survival of wildlife in Central Africa do not look promising. It is difficult both to legislate and to enforce legislation aimed at changing behaviours in regions where the state is absent and very poor people have little option but to fend for themselves. Current legal frameworks are inadequate – they are ill-suited to the ecological, political, cultural and enforcement realities of today (p. 186). Crucially, they lack legitimacy in environments where ‘hunting, trading and eating wild animals are ordinary, normal and desirable activities for many people’ (p. 185). Villagers refuse to curtail their survival activities regardless of what the law says. As a community development worker in the Democratic Republic of the Congo explained, ‘what may be criminal according to the law isn’t necessarily criminal in the eyes of villagers’ (p. 190).
The warning provided by this book highlights the central role of livelihoods and cultural heritage in conservation efforts. New and hopefully improved wildlife management strategies will continue to be formulated and implemented in the region in the coming years, and this book’s message reminds us that the success or failure of these strategies will depend on the extent to which they take account of the cultural, nutritional and economic importance that bushmeat holds for millions of people. Trefon concludes with a grim assessment of the implications of the current failings of wildlife management for human well-being and the survival of the wildlife that inhabit the region’s forests today – in significantly smaller numbers than in decades past.
