Run for Rangers – Rangers across Africa unite to protect wildlife from Covid-19 impact

Leruati Morijo, a ranger at a remote outpost on Lewa Wildlife Conservancy in Kenya, cares for a baby rhino. Credit: Martin Buzora, Wildlife Ranger Challenge

 

 

 

Covid-19 has devastated African wildlife tourism with calamitous impacts on the animals and the people who have dedicated their lives protecting them. In response, rangers across Africa are taking part of a challenge to raise money to bring thousands of their colleagues back to the field. And you can help too.

 

Next week, on 3^rd October, up to 50 ranger teams spanning the African continent will compete in the Wildlife Ranger Challenge, a half marathon race carrying their 25kg backpack containing a typical day’s equipment - along the way, building friendship and raising awareness of the hardship currently faced by those in their profession. 

 

Supporters around the world are encouraged to bolster their efforts and to ‘Run with Rangers’ by taking part in a virtual 5, 10 or 21km run and donating funds or raising sponsorship.

 

Support is coming from the world’s greatest long distance runner, Eliud Kipchoge from Kenya, adventurers and TV personalities Bear Grylls and Levison Wood, as well as the Duke of Cambridge, Tusk’s Patron, along with many other people internationally.

 

In 2018, the global wildlife tourism economy generated over $100bn and provided 9 million jobs, worldwide, but Covid-19 has resulted in an almost complete end to cross-border travel.  The African Union has suggested that the cost of the pandemic on the African travel sector may be $50 billion. 

 

The Game Ranger Association of Africa estimates that there are between 40,000 and 50,000 rangers across the continent and that the vast majority of them have either been furloughed or had their salary reduced by 50% to 80% - leaving families destitute and wildlife vulnerable and unprotected.

 

With remaining rangers stretched to capacity and international and national borders re-opening, it is feared that protected areas across Africa will experience a rapid increase in illegal poaching, as well as a decline in wellbeing and economic security for the communities to whom this wildlife belongs.  This threatens to undo years of rangers’ conservation gains, compromising decades of development and conservation work across Africa.

 

Funds raised through the Wildlife Ranger Challenge will cover salaries for at least 5,000 rangers, enabling them to provide for their families, protect communities and defend endangered wildlife -including elephant, pangolin, rhino and lion - in some of the continent’s most vulnerable areas.

 

“I have spent my entire career working for Malawi’s people and wildlife. I have worked with and alongside wildlife rangers, and even as one myself, and I know they are the lifeblood of the conservation sector in Africa,” says Brighton Kumchedwa, Director, Department of National Parks and Wildlife, Malawi.

 

“I have seen us move from a period of plenty in terms of wildlife to a period of huge losses. We must support rangers to work every day to ensure that our wildlife [is] not lost. The wildlife crisis we are facing is terrifying, but by supporting rangers we are in a position to make a difference, before it is too late. That’s what I remind myself every day.” 

 

 

Rwanda's Gorilla Guardian

Eugene Rutagarama tracking gorillas early morning to locate them before tourists visit them in the Volcanoes National Park in Rwanda. This is what is done everyday to check on the health of each individual gorilla, but also to ensure that tourists visiting them are able to watch them. Photo: courtesy of Eugene Rutagarama.

Last month, the world remembered the Rwandan genocide. We all marvelled at how the country seemed to have healed and moved on, how the economy was blooming - and we talked about lessons to be learned (in the meantime, there are fears that the conflic in the Central African Republic could lead to another genocide...)

 

The Rwandan genocide was still in full swing this month 20 years ago - in just 100 days, nearly one million Tutsis and moderate Hutus were killed. I wanted to speak with a man who worked for peace in a different way: Eugene Rutagarama. He is the man who made sure the genocide didn't include a group of humanity's most endangered relatives – the mountain gorillas.  The gorilla population is now rising and contributing to the nation’s economic growth (an important factor of peace). It is also a rare unifying factor in a region still ravaged by conflicts. Here is my interview with him in The Ecologist.

Rwanda's 'gorilla guardian' - Eugene Rutagarama

Veronique Mistiaen

The 1994 genocide in Rwanda could easily have finished off the mountain gorillas of the Virunga mountains. The fact that they survived is in large part thanks to Eugene Rutagarama. He spoke with Veronique Mistiaen about the primates' future prospects ...

Rwandan biologist Eugene Rutagarama is widely credited for making sure that the victims of the genocide and subsequent wars didn't include the critically endangered mountain gorillas.

The gorillas have and are still contributing to the economic growth of the country - and this in turn is contributing to peace.

Today, nearly half of the world's 800-some remaining mountain gorillas live in the lush tropical forests covering the Virunga Mountains, the chain of volcanoes straddling Rwanda, Uganda and the Democratic Republic of Congo.
Rutagarama's conservation achievements won him the Goldman Environmental Prize - a kind of Nobel Prize for environmental activists - in 2001.

As people all over the world remember Rwanda's 1994 genocide - which was in full swing this month 20 years ago - I wanted to talk to Rutagarama about the remarkable recovery not only of the nation, but of the gorilla population, and his role in it.

The 1994 genocide - today and back then
"April is for me the month when I take time to think of the meaning of the genocide and its implication on the Rwandan society and on me in particular.
"How would I and my relatives be if the genocide didn't occur? What would have been the course of my life? Then I spend time thinking of each of the relatives and friends I lost during the genocide. 

"Almost each Rwandan from all ethnic groups has lost dear relatives and friends or suffered some pain as result of the genocide. The majority of youth is now enjoying the country economic growth and opportunities.
"The coexistence is of course far from being ideal, but tremendous progresses have been made. But the roots of hatred will take long to be completely removed. In this respect, the political leadership matters a lot."

Peaceful giants, and murderous people
Rutagarama is now advisor to the Greater Virunga Transboundary Collaboration - a wildlife conservation cooperation between the Democratic Republic of Congo, Rwanda and Uganda.

He first looked into the liquid brown eyes of a large silverback during a trip to the Virunga National Park with his brother in 1990. The encounter was so moving and thrilling that he decided to dedicate his life to preserving these peaceful giants.

As he was leaving the park with his brother, another encounter was also going to mark his life. A group of youth blocked their way, sneering: "Have you seen these snakes?" Then they addressed their guide: "Hey guide! Why don't you bash these snakes on the head?"

Four years later, nearly one million "snakes" - or "cockroaches" as the Tutsis were also called - and moderate Hutus were slaughtered by Hutus gone mad. Rutagarama's father, mother and three of his brothers were amongst the victims.

A life's mission: protecting the endangered gorillas
Protecting the gorillas in the aftermath of the genocide became the young biologist's single focus. Above all their habitats were at acute risk as the government tried to resettle more than two million people. And that effort also helped him go beyond hatred and despair.

"After the genocide in 1994, the need for protecting gorillas was urgent. It was for me a priority to make sure that they were protected. I put in my focus and my full soul. There was no more space for anything else."

Gorilla conservation, in fact, played a role in healing not just Rutagarama, but the surviving wildlife staff, many of whose former colleagues had been killed or forced to flee. Indeed the gorillas have helped to bring healing to the whole devastated country.

"After a humanitarian disaster as horrific as the genocide, the common struggle to preserve something of shared value allowed people to transcend the conflict and create links."

Elephants, Rhinos, Lions & Tigers to be extinct within a generation

By the time today’s children are 30, there won't be no more elephants, rhinos, tigers or lions roaming in the wild, warns wildlife and conservation charity, Care for the Wild.  They will all have been hunted down by poachers to fuel illegal ivory trade – a direct result of  growing poverty, ethnic rivalry, terrorism and civil war.

Last year, an estimated 40,000 elephants were killed in Africa while the number of rhinos killed so far this year - around 700 - has already surpassed last year’s total.

Care for the Wild estimates that if poaching continues at its current rate and wildlife’ birth rates remain as predicted, some of the world’s most iconic animals - elephants, rhinos, lions and tigers - will no longer exist in their natural habitat as early as 2035.

“Drawing on our own on-the-ground experience and having studied reports from conservation experts around the world, we’ve concluded that at today’s best estimates, these four children’s picture book favourites  – among many others – will all be extinct in the wild by around 2035. That’s just 22 years. It’s devastating to think that by the time our children are in their thirties, they will have to turn to the television or internet to observe these animals in their natural habitat,” explained Philip Mansbridge, CEO of Care for the Wild.

At a recent illegal wildlife trade event in New York, Foreign Secretary William Hague attributed the problem to terrorism and widespread instability.  Care for the Wild agrees, warning that wildlife poaching in Africa, and in particular the poaching of elephants and rhinos to fuel the illegal ivory trade, is intrinsically linked to growing poverty, ethnic rivalry, terrorism and civil war in affected countries.

It is estimated that Al Shabaab - the group linked to the attack on civilians in Westgate Shopping Centre in Nairobi - funds 40% of activities through elephant poaching and ivory trade, while recent reports claimed that ‘warlord’ Joseph Kony had ordered the killing of elephants to fund his rebel army, the Lord's Resistance Army.

As the demand for ivory surges in the growing economies of China, Vietnam and across Asia, the prices it commands has reached an all time high. With a 10kg tusk worth almost £10,000, the profitability of such a lucrative trade is attracting some high profile terrorist groups in need of funds.  These groups kill the wild animals using cyanide and military grade weaponry.

Earlier this year, the United Nations recognised wildlife crime as ‘serious transnational organised crime’, in the same bracket as the drugs trade and gun smuggling, while the UNESCO General Secretariat stated: “Given the current rate of poaching, children from West or Central Africa will one day speak of elephants and rhinoceros as we speak of mammoths: as magnificent creatures belonging to the past.”

Care for the Wild has launched its Tooth Fairy campaign to raise awareness and  funds for its anti-poaching work in Africa. The campaign encourages children to become a Tooth Fairy Hero by pledging the money they would have received for wobbly teeth to the charity and learning about the threatened animals.