Rwanda: Primatologist Jane Goodall to Help Promote Rwanda's Chimpanzees

Dr. Jane Goodall, a renowned British primatologist, ethnologist, anthropologist, and UN Messenger of Peace, From Tanzania, she paid a visit to Rwanda before traveling to the DRC and later Burundi.

Goodall is taken as the world's best expert on chimpanzees, and she is well known for her 45-year study of social and family interactions of wild chimpanzees in Gombe Stream National Park, in Tanzania. Over the years, she has made some pivotal discoveries, for example the use of apparatuses by the primates (e.g. using sticks to get termites in a hole), which constrained researchers to reexamine their perspectives on animals conduct.

Her work spins around inspiring activity in the interest of endangered species, particularly chimpanzees, and encouraging people to do their part to make the world an improved place for people, animals, and the environment surrounding us.

Goodall has likewise established the Jane Goodall Institute, which was contracted by Rwanda Development Board (RDB) to help survey the status of habituation of chimpanzees in Gisovu region, which is situated in the northern part of Nyungwe National Park and consists of unique tourism products like the furthest Source of the Nile, birding, tea tourism and views of tea plantation landscapes, the dark green mountains of Nyungwe forest and Lake Kivu.

In a joint effort with Nyungwe Nziza venture and with the backing of the Jane Goodall Institute, RDB needs to transform Nyungwe National Park into a practical ecotourism objective and also generate sustainable and equitable income for local communities and other stakeholders.

The Institute will additionally give an arrangement for enhancing habituation and directing skills and technical support for expanding staff limit and enlarging the habituation process in the Gisovu Sector. This will help to integrate the chimpanzee product into the overall Gisovu tourism plan.

The Jane Goodall Institute has as of recently finished the appraisal on current advance, future potential and other chimpanzee habituation efforts to-date and an audit of the system of the existing trails, and recommendations for the improvement of new trails depend upon chimpanzees' home range. The procurement of chimp trackers and guides, IT equipment and reference materials has likewise been finished.

The next stage will be the execution of the Chimpanzee Tourism Development Plan that includes proceeded provision of guidance and expertise on the best utilization of IT equipment.

Uganda was Named Top Tourist Destination for year 2013

Unlike other countries, Uganda is one of the best travel destinations with most of the adventurous and most fascinating attractions for 2013; National Geographic listed Uganda as one of the top "new year's 20 must-see places."

"The pride of Uganda's tourism lies in the undisturbed green nature that invites you the minute you arrive in Uganda either via air, water, land or any method of transportation," published by the National Geographic.

"Getting out of the city will be a remunerating viewing with a number of bird species, various wildlife, and the mountain gorillas that have been 'a sizzling cake' to Uganda."

This comes in the wake of tourism accolades being lavished on Uganda and also challenges such as protests under the demonstrations of "walk to work" by opposition leaders.

National Geographic proposes various books and documentaries to watch about Uganda including gifted by nature and The Last King of Scotland.

Abiaz Rwamwiri, a tourism expert with Africa Wildlife Foundation said, "We have a lot of potential we are not tapping into and this is what the recommendation by the National Geographic is telling Ugandans."

He also illustrated that Uganda has got an excellent landscape, interesting wildlife, for example the Mountain gorilla safaris and simple to visit or stay due to the hospitality of the Ugandans."

He still added, "We have got a great deal more on the grounds that there is even Kidepo National Park, which is a remarkable destination, yet is still undiscovered by most of the tourists."

EYE CATCH-UP

The pride of Uganda's tourism lies in the undisturbed green nature that invites you the minute you arrive in Uganda whether via air, water, land or any method of transportation.

A great deal is known to Bwindi and Queen Elizabeth National Park, according to Rwamwiri, however Kidepo is interesting and genuinely wild yet very few visitor visit northern Uganda. He said this was running to be enhanced with the usage other programme supported by USAID and Africa Wildlife Foundation.

Rwamwiri said the international community is continuously pointing out a tremendous opportunity that remains untapped, which we should harness.

"We have to do a lot and streamline the standards, hotels, guides," said Rwamwiri. "Who is a tour guide? Some of these cheat people and others offer services that are below standard."

In a different interview, Lillian Nsubuga, the Public Relations Manager of the Uganda Wildlife Authority (UWA) said Uganda's tourism industry is gaining visibility, but intensive marketing is needed.

"As UWA there has been a big campaign to participate in the international world travel market. So, many people know about Uganda, but we need more aggressiveness," said Nsubuga adding that marketing efforts undertaken by private sector should be harmonised with Government initiatives.

Herbert Byaruhanga, the head of Uganda Safari Guides Association said that Uganda is turning into a preferred destination globally and this means more employment and income is going to come from the tourism destination.

Article written by Yahaya Kimbowa tour consultant at Africa Adventure Safaris with great enthusiasm with Uganda tourism - www.tours-gorilla.com.

Explore Uganda’s beauty: The Kyambura Gorge: home of chimpanzees and diverse bird species

Getting closer to the place, it looks boring. The only welcoming structures in sight are huts belonging to the Uganda Wildlife Authority (UWA) guides and gorge rangers.
Kyambura Gorge which is part of the Queen Elizabeth National Park or Mweya, as it is known in Western Uganda, is common for Chimps tracking, amazing birding and forest walk.
A barricade at which gate collection fees are paid stops you to clear fees for chimp tracking or guide fees as you go through security checks before entering the park.
Upon entering, sounds of water flowing inside the gorge with birds squeaking attract you to the viewing point erected meters above it. As you move on to discover the water’s source, you are welcomed with the exciting hidden secret of a tropical forest growing in a depression that leaves you marveled at how this could have come up.
According to Ben Ejwadu, a senior guide at the Kyambura Gorge, the Gorge was created about 10,000 years ago when land faulted after two opposing forces pulled adjacent to each others causing the 500-metre wide and 100-metre deep depression.
For several years, this tropical forest started emerging and attracted several primates, birds and wildlife,” explained Ejwadu.
Although I did not get time to trek the 16km gorge and the huge Kyambura River, Ejwadu says, they always take visitors through the forest walk to see rare huge and tall trees in the tropical forest, flowers, giant cobwebs, various bird species, colourful butterflies, black and white monkeys and colorful fruits. “Trekking through the Gorge could take about one to three hours where there is a family of habituated chimpanzees,” he says. “Trekking time depends on how far the chimpanzees are feeding or resting from.”
Ejwadu further explains that there are black and white Columbus monkeys, red tailed monkeys, blue monkeys, vervet monkeys and the great apes – chimpanzees that excite tourists as they move around on tree branches in the forest.
The place, according to UWA officials, receives about 260 to 300 visitors a month. These mainly come for chimpanzee tracking.
UWA officials at the gorge are mainly challenged by illegal timber harvesters, firewood collectors and weak tourists who may fail to climb or the step gorge down to the bottom.
Guides and rangers are forced to carry tourists who fail to move because vehicles and helicopters cannot access this thick forest canopy.
The guide notes that the gorge is divided into blocks that make chimps move from one block to another looking for fruits. This sometimes makes trekking these chimps hard. He says: “Huge tree branches sometimes fall, blocking the trails that make movement hard but guides always move with machetes to clear such obstacles along the way.”
Ejwadu says Ugandans are allowed to view the gorge from the viewing point at no cost but pay Shs30,000 for tracking while foreigners are charged $50 (about Shs129,463) for tracking.

The Tales of the Batwa People – Pygmies of Uganda

Locate in Kisoro district Uganda — 20 years ago Uganda's Batwa, or pygmies, were driven away from the forest to make space for a national park. But now the penniless Batwa are being allowed back as tour guides, showing hikers how they lived, this earning the some money in the process.

The Batwa People

Hagumimana Kanyabikingi one of the pygmies, while standing in the rain under the dripping forest canopy offers up a traditional hunting prayer. May we kill an animal, he prays, and not be killed ourselves. For over centuries his ancestors lived here in the forested mountains of southwestern Uganda. They were painfully cast out in 1991 with the creation of Mgahinga National Park well know for its gorilla tours, in the neighborhood of the Kisoro town.

Yet now, the Batwa are being allowed to walk their old forest paths once again, as tour guides on the newly created Batwa Trail.

Thinking about the past, Kanyabikingi explains how they used to use strong vines to trap duiker and bush bucks, or hunt them with poison-tipped arrows.

Half of the money received from the trails will go to the Batwa themselves, while the rest of the money will go to goes to the Uganda Wildlife Authority / UWA, which had been looking for a way to attract travelers to the park.

The mountain gorilla family in Mgahinga national park comes and goes, and until recently they have been living in Rwanda Uganda’s neighboring country in the south. “This meant that there were no gorilla safaris in Mgahinga anymore, and for some time there wasn’t really much tourism activity going on in Mgahinga national park. This meant that the Batwa needed to think of other ways of getting tourists to come and be interested in visiting. We needed something new, and this was really kind of like a God-sent idea. They are able to improve people’s livelihoods, but also it is helping out to generate funds for conservation and biodiversity management in the park”.

For the Batwa as well, the money is very essential for their livelihood. Since the time they were evicted, several hundred have been living in poverty in makeshift camps at the forest’s edge. The Batwa are unaccustomed to the ways of the outside world, says Penninah Zaninka, of the United Organization for Batwa Development in Uganda.

“The forest was everything to them. It was a homeland, they used to have shelter inside the forest, have food inside the forest, and they would collect medicinal herbs, as well as fruits for survival,” Zaninka stated.

Batwa guide George Mpagazihe agrees. In the forest, he says, they could eat animals and wild honey, and cloth themselves in animal skins. Now, he says, they are little more than beggars.

According to Zaninka, the main problem is that the Batwa do not have their own land, making it difficult for them to earn a living. “They lacked educating their children, food security, they worked and they are still working as cheap labor for other people in order to keep them on their land as squatters. So all those fsctores cause them alt of misery, yet they have no home. They are also afraid, she adds, of being evicted yet again.

“They are scared. They are so fearful that these people may evict them a second time. They were evicted from their motherland, which is the forest, and now they are put here," she noted. "But because there is no ownership, they are not very sure.”

For years, the Batwa have been urging the UWA to grant them access to the forest. The new trail is, at least partly, a result of these negotiations. Kanyabikingi says he is happy to be able to walk through the forest once again, and to collect the medicinal herbs his people once used.

But a national park is a delicate thing. Because it has to be protected from human encroachment, the Batwa will never again be allowed to live in the forest. “No, there’s no way the Batwa can move back into the park. Because, you see, we are trying to protect the resources that we have. And the reason why we had to remove the Batwa from the forest was because their activities were not in conformity with natural resource management practices. They were feeding on fruits, trees, burning in the forest, stuff like that.

At the end of the trail lies the sacred Garama Cave, former home of the Batwa king. In it, Batwa musicians sing the old songs for visitors.

We would love to return to the forest, says Kanyabikingi, for the taste of wild honey, and for the sake of our spiritual beliefs. He explains that since they left, even their forest-based religion has been lost.

But for now, it seems the Batwa will have to be content with walking their forest trail with strangers, preserving their culture by sharing it.