One of our own top scientists has been recognised as a leader in the conservation community. Professor Yoshan Moodey of University of Venda’s Department of Biological Sciences in the Faculty of Science, Engineering and Agriculture, was elected as the new president of the prestigious Southern African Wildlife Management Association on the 3rd of September 2025. He now joins a list of the most eminent names in African conservation, and he will lead the organisation for the next two years.
The Southern African Wildlife Management Association (SAWMA) (https://sawma.co.za/) is a 55 year-old professional body that aims to improve the way that wildlife is managed in the southern part of Africa. The association is responsible for the dissemination of the latest cutting-edge science to the conservation community of the subregion, thereby promoting evidence-based conservation management. Without humans, nature would not require conservation. After all, nature has endured for millions of years without the need for management by humans. However, human pressures like habitat destruction, illegal hunting, fencing and exponential population growth have seen the destruction of vast areas that were once inhabited by healthy wildlife populations. Nowadays, most of our wildlife can only live in isolated, and often fenced, state or private protected areas, which require intensive management to survive and flourish. Southern Africa is blessed with many protected areas that still harbour a multitude of wildlife species. This is largely thanks to our long history of conservation management in the subregion, compared to most other parts of Africa where wildlife populations have been decimated or driven to extinction. Southern African conservationists have and continue to pioneer the science of wildlife management, introducing many skills and techniques that are now used widely in other parts of the world. Our wildlife is not only an important part of our heritage, but also one of the foundations of our tourism industry. More importantly, healthy wildlife populations and ecosystems are essential for our own continued survival as a species.
SAWMA hosts an annual conference, bringing together research scientists, wildlife managers and provincial and national wildlife authorities, whose purpose is to develop the science of wildlife management so that conservation interventions are based on sound evidence. SAWMA also publishes a semi-annual scientific journal (African Journal of Wildlife Research), and it comments on policy and other key documents affecting wildlife management in the southern African subregion.
The Executive Dean of the Faculty of Science, Engineering and Agriculture, Prof Natasha Potgieter, wishes Professor Moodley every success in leading and engaging in the conservation community of southern Africa in the coming two years of his presidency.
Prizegiving at the SAWMA Gala Dinner at Mpekweni Beach, Eastern Cape. Prof Moodley and theSAWMA secretary Elma Marais, giving a prize to Carmen Hofmeyr
In the photo: The new SAWMA Council 2025-2026 L-R: Paul Grobler (UFS), Jeanetta Selier
(SANBI), Craig Tambling (Fort Hare), Hanno Killian (!Khamab), Nkabeng Marupeng (SANPARKS), Dan
Parker (UMP), Karlin Muller (UFS), Yoshan Moodley (UNIVEN), Nokubonga Mgqatsa (Rhodes), Kelly
Marnewick (TUT), Frans Radlof (CPUT), Elma Marais (SAWMA). In absentia, Declan Hofmeyr (CCA).
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