By Tendai Makaripe
Part of the money that helped a 16-year-old boy register for his O-level examinations this year came from poaching wildlife.
He says he loves school.
But his parents struggle to pay his fees, and he has repeatedly been sent home over unpaid tuition.
When examination registration came, money earned from illegal hunting helped close the gap.
“I love education, but my parents can’t afford school fees,” he said. “I have been sent home from school numerous times because of fees. Some of the money I paid for my O-level registration this year came from poaching.”
He had already encountered the law.
“I was arrested last year in October and received a warned-and-cautioned statement,” he said.
“At the time of my arrest, I promised myself I would not return to the business, but the poverty here is too much.”
His story exposes a less visible side of wildlife crime in communities bordering Savé Valley Conservancy in southeastern Zimbabwe: experienced poachers allegedly recruiting boys as young as 12, teaching them established hunting methods and paying them for successful kills.
A case monitor working in the area says he recorded 20 boys aged between 12 and 16 in poaching cases between 2024 and 2026 — six in 2024, 10 in 2025 and four so far this year.
“Thirteen of the 20 were linked to just two groups allegedly trained by adults. Eight of those 13 were later arrested again,” he said.
The cases suggest that juvenile poaching is driven by more than poverty alone, with adult recruitment playing a central role.
They reveal what resembles an informal poaching apprenticeship, in which adults exploit poverty, school exclusion and adolescent vulnerability while passing hunting skills to another generation.
Another boy, whom we are identifying as William to protect his identity, described how the recruitment began.
“The men told us that they had good deals to take us out of poverty and asked if we were strong enough,” he said.
“They explained what needed to be done and that we would get US$20 per kill. That was good money for us. The risk was too much, but when we looked at our situations at home, we agreed.”
His first kill frightened him.
“The first kill was nerve-racking, but when we pulled it off, we got tougher and tougher,” William said.
According to the case monitor, the boys targeted impala, kudu and warthog using snares, dogs and spotlights.
Their methods mirror those used in the wider illegal hunting economy around Savé Valley.
A 2025 peer-reviewed study by Josephine Zisadza and four other researchers interviewed 133 illegal hunters and 40 anti-poaching rangers around the conservancy. It found that dogs were used by 86% of interviewed hunters, spotlights by 78% and snares by 65%.
Researchers found household consumption and income generation were each cited by 96% of respondents as motivations, while 78% cited unemployment.
“The study also found a direct link between bushmeat income and education. Seventy-two percent of the hunters interviewed said they used proceeds from bushmeat sales to pay school fees, while 94% used the money for groceries,” read the research in part.
Hunters earning higher income from bushmeat were also more likely to say they intended to hunt again.
That gives important context to the 16-year-old’s account.
Using poaching proceeds to pay examination fees may seem extraordinary, but researchers have already documented a wider connection between illegal hunting income and education costs around Savé Valley.
Poverty, however, is only part of the recruitment story.
A former poacher, who asked to be identified only as Innocent, said children can be deliberately selected because adult recruiters see them as cheap, energetic and easier to control.
“Children are easy to work with. They are energetic, eager to prove themselves and less likely to question the authority of the adults recruiting them,” he said.
But Innocent said their age was an even bigger attraction.
“The thinking among some poachers is that if the children are arrested, they will be treated as juveniles and are less likely to receive lengthy prison sentences,” he said. “If the boys complete the job, it is a major win for the recruiters because they only have to pay them a small amount of money.”
His account suggests that the boys’ vulnerability is not incidental to the system; it may be part of what makes them useful to adult recruiters.
One mother said she had no idea her son was involved until he was arrested.
“I didn’t know my child was involved in poaching. He kept it a secret, and I did not notice any major changes in his behaviour, except that he had started drinking,” she said.
“I confronted him about the drinking, and he promised to stop. Little did I know that he was involved in something much more serious.”
News of the arrest devastated her.
“For some time, I thought he was going to be sent to prison for a very long time,” she said, fighting back tears.
She said she initially wanted to confront the men she heard had trained her son.
But her experience also exposed another influence: the status some successful poachers appear to enjoy in poor communities.
“Poaching is a big thing here, and, sadly, our children look up to some of these older poachers because they appear to be living good lives,” she said.
That sense of status adds another layer to the US$20 payment. Adult recruiters may offer more than cash.
To boys growing up around visible poverty, they can appear to represent money, independence and success.
The adults are not always beyond the reach of the law.
Taurai Dube was sentenced to 24 months in prison, while Lameck Maga received an 11-month prison term.
Zimbabwe’s Children’s Amendment Act specifically criminalises encouraging a child to commit an offence, training a child in the commission of an offence or knowingly providing a child with facilities to commit one.
The offender can face the punishment that could have been imposed had that adult committed the underlying offence.
Criminal law lawyer Mlondolozi Ndlovu argues that the law should therefore look beyond the child caught hunting.
“These are children who are victims of poverty and economic challenges,” he said. “At the end of the day, they are victims of exploitation rather than simply offenders.”
Ndlovu said responsibility must extend to the adults who recruit and use them.
“There should be concerted approaches from all stakeholders and experts in trying to round up these adults who are involving these children,” he said.
Yet prosecuting recruiters addresses only one part of the cycle.
Of the 13 boys linked to the two adult-led groups documented by the case monitor, eight were subsequently arrested again: two from the Mutema group and six from the Maronga group.
Most of the juvenile cases, according to the monitor, went through pre-trial diversion and were assigned probation officers.
The repeat cases do not prove that diversion itself failed.
They do, however, raise a difficult question: what happens when a boy promises to stop poaching but returns to the same household poverty, unpaid school fees, influential poachers and market for illegal meat that existed before his arrest?
Social worker Chido Manangazira believes rehabilitation must therefore reach beyond the individual child.
“There is a need for family and community reintegration, as well as livelihood-support interventions,” she said.
“If family income is strengthened, poverty and school-fee pressure can be reduced, which may also reduce the chances of children turning to poaching.”
She proposes livelihood projects such as poultry production, gardening and other income-generating activities, alongside efforts to keep vulnerable children in school through programmes such as the Basic Education Assistance Module and support from organisations able to pay fees.
Children also need alternatives, she said, including sport, vocational training, agriculture and youth income-generating programmes.
Her argument is supported by decades of research showing that Savé Valley’s bushmeat problem cannot be understood through law enforcement alone.
A 2011 study of the conservancy identified poverty, unemployment, food shortages, weak community benefits from wildlife and inadequate deterrence among the forces sustaining illegal hunting.
Another study covering August 2001 to July 2009 recorded 10,520 illegal hunting incidents, the removal of 84,396 wire snares and at least 6,454 wild animals killed in Savé Valley, showing the scale of a problem that long predates the current juvenile cases.
The newer evidence introduces a different conservation risk: the transfer of knowledge.
Arresting an adult poacher can remove one offender.
Imprisoning a recruiter can disrupt one network.
Removing a snare can save an animal.
But none automatically erases skills already taught to a 12-, 14- or 16-year-old.
The 2025 study found that most illegal hunters interviewed intended to continue hunting and that reoffending was common, leading its authors to recommend stronger enforcement alongside community conservation incentives and measures addressing economic pressures.
For the 16-year-old interviewed for this story, those pressures are not abstract.
He says he wants an education.
Yet poaching helped him pay for it.
Savé Valley’s challenge therefore begins before a snare is set or an animal is killed.
It begins when an experienced poacher approaches a vulnerable boy, promises him a way out of poverty and asks whether he is “strong enough.”
Stopping today’s poacher may save an animal.
Breaking the cycle requires ensuring he does not leave behind a child already trained to replace him.
