Further Questions for
Beks Ndlovu

When former private safari guide Beks Ndlovu opened his first tented camp, Somalisa, in his native Zimbabwe in 2006, he was one of very few Black Africans to own and operate a safari lodge; to the best of his knowledge, he might have been the only one. His company, African Bush Camps, gave travelers unprecedented access to the country’s famous Hwange National Park, with the hopes of preserving Africa’s greatest assets — its people, its nature — by sharing them responsibly. Ndlovu pioneered the hyper-local approach to safari, upending long-held traditions of outsiders sightseeing at a camera’s length. Instead, camps would “operate in harmony with the surrounding land, wildlife, and people”: sustainably, with a minimal environmental footprint, and collaboratively with surrounding villages. Dollars from every night’s stay would go toward small-business loans, conservation programs, and scholarships for local children.

Despite the best intentions, Somalisa was a hard sell at the time, Ndlovu acknowledges, with then-president Robert Mugabe still at the height of his authoritarian powers. Yet Ndlovu quickly expanded into neighboring Zambia and Botswana. Today, he operates 17 camps across southern Africa with some 560 employees between them. His camps include expedition-style outposts with A-frame Meru tents and rain showers; high-end canvas retreats, such as the new Khwai Lediba camp in Botswana; and a handful of luxurious lodges with private plunge pools, including the Atzaró Okavango Camp, new to Botswana’s Okavango Delta since April. All share the same goal: to connect travelers with the land and use tourism to benefit local communities and wildlife. Ndlovu talks to Further about founding a safari business as a Black African, his favorite park in southern Africa, and the country he most wants to visit beyond Africa.

As a guide, I traveled throughout Africa with adventurers and wealthy people. We had some of the greatest experiences in places that, when I tried to go back years later, just didn’t exist anymore, and in some cases, the people who lived there were worse off. We can’t address injustices to the land, to the wildlife, and to the people of Africa alone, so how do I create something that goes much further than me? How can I go back home and create an army of people that all believe in the same thing? My first camp was partly funded by clients who shared these amazing experiences and believed in what I was embarking on.

For the first six years of my life, I lived in Lupane, a little village [outside of Hwange National Park]. For kids there, your whole daily interaction would be to help out with livestock, whether it was cattle or goats. It would be letting them out from their bomas (enclosures) in the morning, and then going to retrieve them in the afternoon. We grew up with elephants raiding our fields and lions eating our livestock, and we learned how to protect the livestock and avoid conflict. But it wasn’t until I was in high school that I realized that there is a career that one can build out of learning from nature — that tourism could be an outlet to go back to my roots.

There’s been a radical change in terms of Black African people being involved as guides. The next step is African people starting their own businesses. But it still remains very much a White-dominated industry. What I’ve tried to do with my organization is to employ locals, have them run these businesses. Hopefully that inspires them and shows them that it is possible for somebody who looks like them, speaks like them, and comes more or less from the same background.

When I started, travelers to Africa saw it as something that Africans needed to do themselves — they just wanted to come on holiday and enjoy this fantastic continent. Over the years, that’s shifted, especially post-Covid. Travelers are now saying, I want to know that the place that I’m going to — the company I’m traveling with — is actually having a meaningful impact.

I’ll give you an example. Maunga is a small community just outside of our Thorntree River Lodge, in Livingstone, Zambia. The poverty there was quite dire. And the community was perpetually cutting down trees, and turning them into charcoal to be able to sell for their survival. In the short term, it was meeting a need, but long term, it was going to kill the community. There were also no health facilities there, so there was a very high infant mortality rate.

So how do you go in this community and begin to tackle some of the conservation issues? We set up a clinic, because you’ve got to have a healthy community. Next to that is this primary school, which now has fresh water. We drilled boreholes there to supply them with water. It now has solar panels and access to the Internet. We did all that before we even began to have conversations with them about their trees and the forest. The next step was setting up a program that encouraged them to plant trees and become custodians of the area.

It is a tough question. I spent a number of years as a river guide canoeing the Zambezi River, and an area that I became very fond of is the Lower Zambezi [National Park, bordering Zambia and Zimbabwe]. That unique habitat is very special to me.

I went to the [Republic of the] Congo just before the Covid lockdown. Going to that part of the world, which is very remote and rural — and some of those places are very poverty-stricken — it just blew my mind because I was not familiar with either the habitat or the people and culture. It reminded me that this continent is so diverse and has such different experiences in it.

I would love to visit Peru. I think I would benefit from exploring those mountains and learning about the cultures and communities and how they’re very much in tune with their land.

I’ve had a love affair for over 20 years with Mozambique. But last year I discovered Marapi house, which is in The Sanctuary, [a marine and terrestrial conservation site] about a 40- to 45-minute ride from the town of Vilankulo. It’s so organic and done so beautifully. But it’s not about the 1,000-thread-count Egyptian cotton sheets. I love great design, but it’s really about the place. The beaches are pristine, the water is warm, and there are communities living alongside it. It speaks to everything that is Africa.

Visit africanbushcampsfoundation.org to learn more about the nonprofit arm of ABC — and get inspired for your next safari at africanbushcamps.com. 

Amy Farley is the Executive Editor at Fast Company, where she edits and writes features about the intersection of business and culture.