MAASAI MARA, Kenya — One of nature’s most spectacular sights, East Africa’s great wildebeest migration, went largely unwatched this year as the effects of the coronavirus pandemic are felt as far as the continent’s wilderness.
Travel restrictions kept tourists away for the annual wildlife migration in Kenya’s Maasai Mara National Reserve and only a handful of guides and park wardens were there to watch thousands of wildebeest make their famous trek.
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Although the absence of tourists makes little difference to the giant herd moving between Kenya and Tanzania, it’s a serious problem for the park, the local government and the surrounding community.
“Covid has really affected so many operations for us here in the reserve in the sense that the revenue, the funds, that the county government was collecting from Maasai Mara National Reserve has gone to zero,” said chief warden James Sindiyo.