Within the Ishasha Sector there are three river systems and the elephants come from the riverine forests to the community areas to crop raid. Along the eastern border of the QENP there is a hard edge of subsistence farming communities. By 1998 this border region had been experiencing serious crop raiding for over a decade, resulting in losses to the farmers and revenge killings of elephants. Some 339 crop raiding incidents in the Ishasha River Region were recorded between April 2001 and July 2003 at an average of 19 crop raids per month. In the last 18 months, some 1403 crop raiding events were fully documented demonstrating an alarming increase. With community crop losses beyond tolerable, communities have been spearing and poisoning elephants in revenge.

The Uganda Conservation Foundation, along with project partners, the local community, and the Uganda Wildlife Authority (UWA) have embarked upon hand-digging a 20 kilometer, 2 by 2-meter trench as the first part of a larger strategy towards mitigating crop raiding in the region. The trench is being dug by the local villagers from the Ishasha Customs village through Bukorwe to Rushorosa and all the work has been carried out through manual labor as machines are not available or affordable.