Rwanda will import animals including lions and rhinos and invite five-star hotel developers to upgrade Akagera<\/span> National Park in a project funded by investors including the head of Wal-Mart. <\/strong><\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/strong><\/p>\n The $12.3 million project is being managed by Akagera<\/span> Management Co., a unit of African Parks, the South Africa-based non-profit development company. Wal-Mart Chairman Samuel Robson Walton pledged $2.5 million to the project, Bryan Havemann<\/span>, project manager for Akagera<\/span>, said in an interview.<\/p>\n This year, the industry may generate $216 million, the government said in March. In 2008, 17,000 people visited Rwanda\u2019s Volcanoes National Park to see the country\u2019s mountain gorillas, according to the World Bank.<\/p>\n \u201cWe can keep people who come for the gorillas in the country,\u201d Havemann<\/span> said in a phone interview yesterday from Kigali, the capital. \u201cThe economic effect is going to be huge.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n The Rwandan government last month said it would spend $2.3 million helping build an electric fence as long as 75 miles (120 kilometers) around parts of the 386 square-mile reserve. The barrier will curb poaching and quell some of the human-animal conflict that has plagued the park in recent years, Havemann<\/span> said.<\/p>\n \u201cOne of our biggest problems is that people set snares by the hundreds,\u201d he said. Another issue is keeping the animals in the reserve. Last month, 55 elephants \u2014 about half the total population \u2014 wandered onto nearby farmland before being driven back by park authorities, Havemann<\/span> said.<\/p>\n The Athens Group, a U.S<\/span>. luxury-hotel developer, expressed interest in two of the three hotel concessions available at Akagera<\/span>, Havemann<\/span> said. The group may build resorts that rent rooms for $1,500 to $2,000 per night, he said. The company declined to comment when contacted by e-mail.<\/p>\n The electric fence is expected to be completed in about a year, after which developers plan to re-introduce black rhinos and lions into the park. The animals were exterminated by poachers and cattle farmers who overran the park in the early 1990s<\/span> amid conflict and lawlessness. They will join elephants, buffalo and leopards, making the park home to the \u201cbig five\u201d animals, a draw for international tourists, Havemann<\/span> said.<\/p>\n The Walton FamilyFoundation<\/span> didn\u2019t immediately respond to an e-mailed request for comment.<\/p>\n <\/p><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Rwanda will import animals including lions and rhinos and invite five-star hotel developers to upgrade Akagera National Park in a project funded by investors including the head of Wal-Mart. The $12.3 million project is being managed by Akagera Management Co., a unit of African Parks, the South Africa-based non-profit development company. Wal-Mart Chairman Samuel Robson […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[15],"tags":[],"byline":[277],"hashtag":[],"class_list":["post-131","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-tourism","byline-igihe-com-reporter"],"bylines":[{"id":277,"name":"IGIHE.com Reporter","slug":"igihe-com-reporter","description":"","image":{"id":0,"url":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/?s=96&d=mm&f=y&r=g","alt":"Default avatar","title":"Default avatar","caption":"","mime_type":"image\/jpeg","sizes":[]},"user_id":null}],"contributors":[{"id":277,"name":"IGIHE.com Reporter","slug":"igihe-com-reporter","description":"","image":{"id":0,"url":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/?s=96&d=mm&f=y&r=g","alt":"Default avatar","title":"Default avatar","caption":"","mime_type":"image\/jpeg","sizes":[]},"user_id":null}],"featured_image":null,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/131","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=131"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/131\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=131"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=131"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=131"},{"taxonomy":"byline","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/byline?post=131"},{"taxonomy":"hashtag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/hashtag?post=131"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}