Newsletter No 3

Letter from the Project Manager

A warm welcome to all once again, and an especially warm welcome to all the new recipients of the Nomad African Trust newsletter! As I'm sure our existing recipients will notice we are now operating in a new web-based format as from this month so I hope that we have been able to make the design compatible with everyone's various browsers.

It has also come to my attention over the last month that many of you would like to know more about our NGO partners, and so starting this month I will be doing a small profile on each one of the three of them to give you a bit more background as to why we became involved with them in the first place. This month we will be featuring the African Wildlife Foundation which will also be making it's first appearance in the newsletter, so thank you to Harry for taking the time to give us a bit more insight into your activities.

On a different note we will be including our first financial breakdown for our first quarters operations in this newsletter and we are confident that from here we will go from strength to strength. We look forward to your support in making a reality.

Financial Data:

Beneficiaries

AWF

The African Wildlife Foundation (AWF) is an International African non-governmental organisation (NGO), founded in 1961 to improve the capacity of African institutions and individuals to manage wildlife and other natural resources.  It has evolved itself over decades into applying now an integrated landscape level conservation programme, known as the African Heartlands programme. They believe  Africa's wildlife and natural resources should be conserved not only for their own sake, but as one of the principal resources to catalyze economic growth and improve human wellbeing.  AWF focuses its support on land conservation, applied species research, development of community conservation enterprises, continues to build capacity, and supports development of appropriate policies.  It now works in eight landscapes, called Heartlands, across 11 countries in central, eastern and southern Africa, while having recently started to explore expansion into West Africa as to become a truly African-wide organisation.

From its regional office in Johannesburg, oversight is provided to the Limpopo Heartland, a vast transboundary landscape of 95,000 km2, covering Kruger National Park (KNP) and adjoining private and community conservation areas in South Africa, Gonarezhou NP and the Sengwe corridor in Zimbabwe, and Limpopo, Banhine and Zinave National Parks and the interstitial multiple land-use areas in Mozambique.  Within South Africa the work focus is on Leopard research in KNP and to provide support to communities living adjacent to KNP help to obtain benefits from living close to such an economic powerhouse.

Natural ecosystems are often dynamic.  There is now a growing concern that the lion population of the Kruger National Park is negatively affected by bovine tuberculosis (BTb) resulting in a decline in lion numbers.  Lion being the top predator is thought to suppress abundances of other large predators such as leopard.  Due to the reported effects of BTb on lions, leopard numbers may be on the increase.  There are suggestions that leopards feed on jackals, and anecdotal evidence suggests that jackal population density in the Kruger National Park has declined.  It is thus likely that the negative effects of BTb on the lion, may lead to cascade effects, both negative and positive in other predators.  Human activities such as poaching and disease transmission may mask the observed trends in natural environments.

The AWF Leopard research project is aimed at understanding the issues surrounding leopards in the Kruger National Park as a result of the effects of BTb on the lion population, and the effects of human activities especially when animals leave the park into surrounding communities (Mozambique).  To understand the trends that are currently observed, we are first attempting to establish leopard numbers using camera traps under the watchful eye of leopard research officer Nakedi Maputla (pictured right).

Sodwana Bay Recycling

While discussion is still taking place between the Umkhanyakude community and district level role-players to decide on the exact location of the recycling centre, Gavin Eichler and Francois Du Toit have been hard at work ensuring that this unspoilt piece of coast line (pictured right) remains just that and have pushed ahead with the implementation of the project by removing almost eight tons of tins that would otherwise have ended up in landfills around the bay.

They are also in the process of removing 300 tons of glass from the greater iSimangaliso wetland park, that includes the world famous St Lucia estuary, and they have set their sights on removing the estimated 600 tons of remaining glass at a rate of between 60 to 100 tons per month thereafter. Local accommodation providers have also come on board and asides from committing to the recycling of their paper, glass, plastic and tins, they are also starting to process their organic waste for use in the nurseries that Francois and Gavin have planned to help the communities establish.    


Green Revolution

Meanwhile up in  Mpumalanga, near Kruger National Park, Eugene Cussons and his team are hard at work developing the Eden surveyor which uses infrared heat signatures to identify animal species and numbers from the air. The Green Revolution team is in the process of testing their forward looking infrared cameras at the Jane Goodall Institute-Chimp Eden sight near Nelspruit and are looking forward to beginning the testing period that will see the cameras fitted into gliders for aerial photo's that will aid research in Kruger and elsewhere across the continent.

After their initial success with un-cooled units the team is busy developing a temperature regulated camera that will provide the accuracy required to pick-up heat signatures from large distances. This identification tool will prove invaluable in remote areas that have revealed little information thus far about animal numbers hidden in their midst.

Remember to check out our website for more information on the Trust as well as  regularly updated conservation and development related articles on www.nomadafricantrust.co.za