Data from: Promoting human-carnivore coexistence through outreach in Namibia’s eastern communal conservancies

Education and community outreach are fundamental to raising conservation
awareness in rural communities for alleviating human wildlife conflict
(HWC). Evaluating the impacts of programs aimed at reducing HWC is
necessary to justify the effectiveness of mitigation strategies, and to
provide feedback for designing sustainable conservation initiatives at the
community level. We examined the impacts of an outreach program in four
eastern communal conservancies in Namibia using questionnaire surveys
administered to outreach workshop participants. Most participants
experienced livestock losses (91.7%), which were caused primarily by
predators and droughts. Following workshop attendance, significant
declines in livestock losses were observed and perceptions regarding the
abundances of predators in the area reflected the reality on the ground
more accurately. These results suggest that workshops can be effective in
teaching communities about predator ecology and mitigating depredation
losses of livestock. Therefore, workshops can be used as an important
strategy to promote conservation and sustainable livelihoods.