Kafue National Park is the largest national park in
Zambia, covering an area of about 22,400 km². It is the second largest park in
Africa and is home to over 55 different species of animals. The park is named for the Kafue River. It stretches over three provinces: North
Western,
Central and
Southern. The main access is via the Great West Road from
Lusaka to
Mongu which crosses the park north of its centre. Seasonal dirt roads also link from Kalomo and Namwala in the south and south-east, and Kasempa in the north.
Kafue National Park was established in 1924 after the British colonial government moved the traditional owners of the area, the Nkoya people of (King) Mwene Kabulwebulwe, from their traditional hunting grounds into the
Mumbwa District to the east. Dissatisfaction with the pace of development in Central Province and a lack of benefit from tourism in the park have led to calls from Nkoya leaders to establish a new province in the area which they have proposed to call Kafue Province.
Most of the park lies in the Central Zambezian Miombo woodlands ecoregion characterised by savanna grasslands with Miombo tree species, growing thickly in some patches, with a few small dambos (grasslands which become marshy in the rainy season) interspersed among them. In the south there are stony hills and rocky outcrops where the sparser Zambezian and Mopane woodlands ecoregion takes over, and Mopane trees adapted to hotter drier conditions replace Miombo. A thin belt of evergreen forest lines the banks of the Kafue River, which has been controversially dammed just outside the park at
Itezhi-Tezhi Dam, forming a reservoir within the park. Patches of Baikiaea (teak) and Cryptosepalum evergreen forest occur in the south and west.
