SAVE THE ELEPHANTS - Long Term Monitoring Program, Northern Kenya
Elephants Long Term Monitoring program has been running for ten years in Samburu National Reserve in northern Kenya. Through daily observation, researchers are able to understand elephant movements and behavior, and investigate the main challenges affecting elephant society. World Women Work has funded a GPS collar for a matriarch elephant named "Loldalga".
"We support basic research on elephant behavior and ecology, and have pioneered elephant GPS radio tracking to provide fresh insight into elephant ways of life. By understanding elephant movements we can help approach conservation from an elephant's perspective."
- Iain Douglas Hamilton, Founder Save the Elephants.
The Last Great Tuskers
Save the Elephants has been monitoring elephants in Northern Kenya since 1995 through two key methods: individual identification and monitoring, and remote tracking using collars. STE is also heavily involved with monitoring the illegal killing of elephants in Samburu and Laikipia districts and works closely with the Kenya Wildlife Service to share data and identify poaching hotspots. Unfortunately, not only is poaching still widely evident in northern Kenya, but STE and KWS are starting to see smaller and smaller ivory tusks being confiscated off poachers. Any elephant carrying decent sized tusks these days will almost certainly be at threat from poachers during his or her lifetime. Amongst the elephants of northern Kenya there are still a handful of huge elephant bulls carrying majestic tusks. These large-tusked, old bull elephants carry some of the best genetics of the population and their survival is critical if their successful genes are to be passed onto the next generation.
STE already monitors some of these large bulls but resources are tight and the distances that they have to travel to monitor and collar these bulls are vast. WWW is helping to support STE’s efforts to monitor and track these last great tuskers and to assist with their protection.
The Chinese Road Phenomenon
Since 2007 the wild northern road that stretches from Mount Kenya up to the border of Ethiopia has been under intense construction by a Chinese Road company. The conversion of a rough track to a tarmac super-highway is anticipated to bring faster access to remote areas of northern Kenya helping to improve business links and tourism opportunities. Unfortunately the new road passes directly between three national reserves, Samburu, Buffalo Springs and Shaba. Save the Elephants works in all three of these reserves monitoring and tracking elephant movements to help us understand elephant behaviour and how elephants use the environment. Despite the potential benefits for development, the highway has brought a number of problems to this once remote area. Incidents of poaching and bush meat hunting have soared since the construction camp was established next to Shaba. Additionally, wildlife is being hit by fast moving trucks as there are no speed bumps or traffic calming measures presently in place along the stretch of road passing through the reserves.
Two incidents of elephants and their calves being hit by trucks have been carefully reported on by STE staff but not all incidents will be so carefully tracked due to the time consuming nature of monitoring the road kill reports. WWW is helping to provide resources to STE to enable them to monitor and report on any road kill incidents that involve elephants and any other endangered species. Additionally the funds will support STE’s efforts to engage in a dialogue with the road company and county council officers to get better sign postage and traffic alert measures along the highway. These methods should help to warn drivers that they are entering a wildlife migration zone and that careful driving is required to avoid hitting crossing animals. STE will also continue to report all incidents of poached or injured elephants to Kenya Wildlife Service to assist them with controlling poaching outbreaks in the area.
Save the Elephants and Elephant Watch Safaris Scholarship Program, Northern Kenya
Save the Elephants has partnered with the Elephant Watch Safaris to create a fund for education for local children who might otherwise not get a chance to go to school. WorldWomenWork provides scholarships annually for tuition and living expenses for girls who have shown promise in their school work.
In 2010, scholarships were awarded to two girls to attend St. Theresa’s Girls Secondary School in Wamba, in the Rift Valley of Kenya. Edina Orguba Dararo and Flavian Mwena both come from extremely disadvantaged backgrounds. Flavia’s parents both died of AIDS-related illnesses. Flavia was raised by her grandmother until she, too, died and Flavia was looked after by her school headmistress. She was second in her class at primary school and does very well in English and Math. Edina was raised by her mother and is the first in her family to go to secondary school. Her family is very poor and lost all of its livestock in the recent drought. Edina has done very well in school and excels in English, Math, and Science.
The partnership with Save the Elephants offers the girls an opportunity to get a proper secondary education combined with hands-on training on elephants and general environmental awareness. Students are also encouraged to become ambassadors of their culture, and most graduates of the program are now actively involved in conservation and eco-tourism.
WorldWomanWork supports this clinic in their mission to provide education to local women and girls on family planning and HIV/AIDS prevention. The clinic provides services to over 3,000 people per year, including the distribution of family planning aids that would not otherwise be available in these communities. Critical to reducing poverty in Africa is the education of women and girls about their life choices, particularly in the area of reproduction and maternal health.
WorldWomenWork supports the Elephant Nature Park in Northern Thailand, a sanctuary for Asian Elephants run by female conservationist Sangduen “Lek” Chailert. Funds from WorldWomen Work have been used to buy several elephants out of their working situations and maintain and expand the park. Many of the elephants have suffered terrible trauma from accidents and mistreatment during their lives. Lek created the sanctuary to protect the elephants and to educate the public about the importance of saving them.
We have also partnered with an independent film studio, Swell Pictures, to make a full-length feature film called Losing the Elephants that chronicles Lek’s work and examines the unique gifts and dire plight of this amazing animal. Please click here to view the trailer for our film Loosing the Elephants.
DIRECT IMPACT AFRICA - Waka Simba (Women of Strength) and Samba Raishe (God's Power) womens’ groups, Zambia
Working with these two groups, WorldWomenWork provides the funds to send five women to Riverside Sewing School for six months and to purchase sewing machines for their use. The women’s groups are based in two villages where large mining interests threaten the natural environment, The local women participating – some of who have never held a pencil – are learning to make bags and other crafts to sell to safari lodges along the nearby Zambezi River. This project not only provides skills and income to the women involved, but it also gives them the ability to see beyond their village and the status to take part in decisions about the way their lands are being used. In 2010, WorldWomenWork will provide the funds for ten more women to attend sewing school and will also fund new classes in organic farming.
DIRECT IMPACT AFRICA - Chiawa Girls Basic School Dormitory Project:
Most of the villages surrounding the main village of Chiawa have no school so children who wish to attend from remote villages must board at the government dormitory. Conditions of the dorm are well below basic standards, with girls sleeping on worn pieces of foam mattresses on the floor (see photos attached). Forty four girls are currently living at the basic school dorm. Due to harsh conditions girls often leave school or get married at age 13 or 14 and drop out of school. DIA plan to make conditions more favorable for young girls and develop programs which inspire them to stay in school.
PLANS FOR RENNOVATION:
A current objective of DIA is to renovate the girls' dorm as follows:
- Clean and paint interior of existing walls and floor.
- Replace broken glass panes and install screens.
- Build and supply 15 bunk-beds, with double mattresses. These beds will comfortably sleep 60 girls and double available space in the dorm.
- Build adjacent ablution/privacy area for washing. This space will be fitted with plumbing outlets to be developed later when water is brought into the dorm. At present it will serve as a private area for girls to wash themselves by bringing water into the room with buckets from the communal well.
In Sabah, Malaysia, WorldWomenWork supports a team of four Muslim widows who are part of a project to protect orangutan and pigmy elephant habitats that are increasingly threatened by the development of palm oil plantations. The women are planting and maintaining trees in areas that have been deforested and abandoned. They have also developed local tree nurseries and run education and tree-planting programs for children in the surrounding areas. The project has attracted eco-tourism groups to the area that provide income to local communities as a result of conservation activity.
Forest Elephant Public Awareness Project, Republic of the Congo
WorldWomenWork helps pay the salaries of a team of activists who travel from village to village to educate people on the cost of elephant poaching to local communities. Poaching for ivory remains the number one cause of death for elephants in the area. The team disseminates videos about the complex social behavior of elephants, the laws regarding their protection, and discusses the long-term economic benefits of protecting the elephants for tourism. The team has reached 100,000 individuals and covered more than 3,000 kilometers, mostly on foot.
Scholarships for Girls, The Greater Himalayan Foundation, Nepal
The Nepalese government schools provide basic education free of cost up to class 10 (roughly 10th grade in the US), but families have to pay money to have their children educated beyond that point. With limited resources, Nepalese families often opt to have boys continue schooling, but girls are left behind. WorldWomenWorks supports three girls per year in school at a cost of $80 per month.
1998-2009 PROJECTS
WorldWomenWork funds organizations and initiatives that strive to provide a better life for women, their families, and the natural world around them. Our grants range from $2,500 to $25,000, and the projects we fund fit generally in three categories: conservation, girl’s education, and skills development for women.
Women in Conservation:With their close relationship to the land and their dependence on it, women have emerged as conservation leaders throughout the world. We fund organizations, research projects, and individual initiatives by women working to save endangered species and ecosystems.
Elephant Listening Project
is run by leading conservationist Katy Payne in Gabon. WorldWomenWork has contributed to Katy’s "Species Action" program, which conducts acoustical studies of elephant communication. This important "fingerprinting" project will eventually help researchers conduct an accurate census of forest elephant populations.
Africat Foundation
founded by Lise Hansen, focuses on reducing conflict between large carnivores, particularly cheetahs, and humans that often occur in the commercial and communal farming communities of Namibia by educating farmers and relocating animals that have been confiscated or orphaned. WorldWomenWork provided funds for water, electricity, and other operating costs of the Africat Foundation Clinic.
Nepal Mothers Group Association
is a grassroots community organization that focuses on improving the environmental conditions in the village in Jomson, Nepal. WorldWomenWork gave the group a grant that allowed them to make improvements to their meeting house. The group now rents out the space to generate income for projects like tree planting and garbage collection.
Sri Lanka Wildlife Conservation Society (SLWCS)
focuses on preserving biodiversity. After researching conflict between humans and elephants, SLWCS initiated a community-based project called Saving Elephants by Helping People. WorldWomenWork contributed funds towards an electric fence in the Lahugala Kitulana National Park that has kept elephants from wandering into nearby villages.
Women's Union of Kon Tum
works in the lush forests of the Kon Tum region of Vietnam, which is home to rare species such as the tiger, langur monkeys, and white-cheeked gibbons. As in many other regions, women are the natural resource managers. WorldWomenWork donated funds to help the group review the community’s use of natural resources and to develop plans for their conservation.
Wind River Bear Institute
was founded by Carrie Hunt, a wildlife biologist who has studied bears for more than 20 years. She has developed a technique she calls "bear shepherding" that teaches bears how to recognize and avoid human territorial boundaries. Wind River Bear Institute also works with local communities to help reduce factors that lure bears to people. WorldWomenWork supported Wind River Bear Institute with a general operating grant.
Education for Nature
is a program in partnership with the World Wildlife Fund. The focus is to foster a self-sustaining corps of conservation leaders in Africa, Asia, and Latin America. WorldWomenWork has invested in the training of three women candidates, two from Tanzania and one from Nepal.
Girl’s Education:As girls are educated, they not only reap benefits for themselves and their families, but for the natural environments as well. We fund initiatives that help girls to become caretakers of the natural resources and endangered species in their communities.
Himalayan Girls Scholarship Fund
has distributed funds to girls from the Bardia and Kanchenjunga areas in Nepal. WorldWomenWork provided funding for 160 scholarships.
The Girl Child Fund, Eastern Bhutan
was established by the National Women’s Association of Bhutan to provide scholarships for orphaned or poverty-stricken girls. WorldWomenWork provided funding for 28 scholarships.
The Kiunga Education Support Program
reaches over 1,200 students in ten primary schools in the Kiunga Marine Reserve on the northern coast of Kenya. The program teaches conservation, ecology, and skills such as making handicrafts from “flipflops” that wash up a local beach. WorldWomenWork provided funding for 15 scholarships. In addition the Holiday Students Program provides a nine-day adventure for seven students ranging from beach cleanups to solar cooking to two nights of turtle patrol.
Mafia Island School Initiative
was established to support girls’ education in this richly diverse area of the Tanzanian coast. WorldWomenWork has funded the tuition and living expenses of 83 girls, as well as extra-curricular training in elementary marine ecology. We also gave the funds to refurbish an abandoned dormitory and purchase more than 700 textbooks.
Madagascar Girls Scholarship Fund
was set up by WorldWomenWork to send girls to school in the extremely dry and delicate “Spiny Forest” region of Madagascar. As a result, 15 girls have completed secondary school, where the curriculum includes conservation and family planning.
The Turtle Islands Girls Scholarships Program
was set up by WorldWomenWork to fund girls’ education in this island region between the Philippines and Malaysia. The area is the only trans-frontier protected area for marine turtles. Fourteen girls completed school with the help of these funds.
The Edutainer Project
is an innovative program based in Soweto, South Africa that aims to provide disadvantaged children with the skills essential for success in their later schooling. The Edutainer is an instant classroom made from a shipping container for up to 30 children between the ages of two and six.
Native American Girls Scholarship
funds participation in a three-week work-study program Oaxaca, Mexico, with a focus on preservation and conservation of the endangered Leatherback and Olive Ridley sea turtles.
Skills Development for Women:There is no road to environmental protection without economic opportunity. We fund initiatives that provide women with the skills to support their families and protect their natural environment.
Save the Elephants and Elephant Watch Safaris
work together to support Samburu women in Kenya through conservation education and skills building. WorldWomenWork supported the Samburu Beading Project which trains women to create and market sophisticated traditional beaded shawls and other magnificent crafts. The women use their profits to send their children to school.
Snow Leopard Enterprises (SLE)
is based in Kyrgyzstan and Mongolia and its mission is to provide access to international markets for handcrafted felt products of nomadic herders, and to discourage hunting of the indigenous snow leopard. WorldWomenWork supported a design summit where the women of SLE were given technical support and design assistance to so that they might better prepare their products for purchase by a sophisticated international clientele.
Udzungwa Mountains Women's Development Project
aims to reduce the destruction of the forest in this unique part of Tanzania, which is inhabited by red colobus and mangabey monkeys. WorldWomenWork has helped this project grow from an endeavor to introduce fuel-efficient stoves, to a women-run enterprise that trains local women in business skills.
