Mokala National Park has just gained its status as the first Vulture Safe Zone for SANParks, after years of collaborative conservation work to protect the threatened species.
Northern Cape, South Africa (28 November 2025) – Mokala National Park in the Northern Cape has officially been certified as a Vulture Safe Zone!
As per the Endangered Wildlife Trust (EWT), it’s the first national park in the country to receive that status. It follows years of work from the EWT and SANParks teams who’ve been grafting behind the scenes to make it happen.
The idea of a Vulture Safe Zone comes from what occurred in Asia in the 1980s and 1990s, when vulture populations in the landscape crashed by more than 99% due to a veterinary drug called Diclofenac, shares EWT.
Livestock treated with the drug died, vultures fed on the carcasses, and entire populations were wiped out. Without vultures to clean up the ‘mess’ in nature, disease spread quickly, and the effects on people were devastating.
“The disappearance of Vultures in India led to the ecological tipping of scales, causing the death of tens of thousands of people due to the spread of pathogens because of the decline in vultures, known as the environment’s clean-up crew.” shares the EWT.
The crisis forced conservationists to rethink how to protect vultures before they disappear, and the result was the international Vulture Multi-Species Action Plan, which recognises Safe Zones as a practical way to reduce risks in areas where vultures breed, forage or roost.
A Safe Zone means no poisoning, no contamination from harmful veterinary drugs and safer power lines, protected nesting areas and long-term monitoring of the birds that use the landscape.
“Among the criteria for a VSZ is that the area must be poison free and carcasses may not be laced with NSAIDs, power lines are mitigated to prevent electrocutions and collisions by wildlife, breeding or roosting populations of vulture species are protected from disturbance; and that breeding and/or roosting populations are monitored annually.” shares the EWT.
In Mokala, the team has been monitoring vultures and other raptors since 2008, and over the last three years their Birds of Prey team and park management have been actively tackling threats that impact vulture numbers, aiming to get the park certified as a Safe Zone.
Much of it has required hands-on work and planning.
Working with Eskom, all power lines running across the park were reviewed and upgraded to be vulture-safe. Several dams inside the park were also fitted with nets, thanks to a donation from the SANParks Honorary Rangers. The nets stop birds from drowning, which is a surprisingly common threat.
And because Mokala is such an important breeding site for White-backed Vultures, the monitoring work has been extensive too. More than 1,100 vulture chicks have been ringed and tagged since the EWT began working there, including 90 chicks tagged in October this year alone. Across the wider breeding area, which includes neighbouring farms, 155 active nests have already been counted this season.
The certification is a nod towards the hard work and effort it takes to protect species that are still under very real pressure. Producing a safe zone doesn’t make threats on vulture populations disappear, but it does give the species a better chance at survival.
“The certification is a further step in a working relationship between the Endangered Wildlife Trust (EWT) and SANParks to conserve threatened species and restore and preserve the habitats they require to survive,” says the CEO of the EWT, Yolan Friedmann.
“With the Vulture Safe Zone certification in place, Mokala National Park now has ample support to continue critical conservation efforts to protect their resident vulture populations, as well as other threatened birds of prey, including Martial Eagle and Tawny Eagle,” said Friedmann.
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