From competition to coexistence: a model for sustaining human and non-human animal populations

The concept of sustainability recognizes that an awareness of and adherence to ecological principles or theory is required to achieve sustainability. One form of ecological theory, competition theory, describes how animal species that are competing for limited resources may coexist. Is it possible that the solutions' derived by nature are in fact models for resolving competition between human and non-human animal species? This paper presents a Sustainable Resource Partitioning (SRP) Model which incorporates competition theory as a means of describing how human animal (HA) and non-human animal (NHA) species can move from competition to coexistence. The model was applied in the field setting of Mozambique where a presumed threatened avian population and a local human animal population were competing for resources. The model examined contested resources and demonstrated a means of sustainable partitioning through analyses of resource utilization functions (RUF's). The model is generalizable and results in a practical means for approaching the sustainable coexistence of competing HA and NHA species.