Not Only About Wildlife

10 October 2009

The Endangered Wildlife Trust (EWT) is all about “Conservation in Action” and work on the ground is our hallmark. With this comes the realisation that all our fieldworkers’ efforts would come to naught if they did not have community buy-in. The EWT’s Riverine Rabbit Working Group (EWT-RRWG) aims to ensure the survival of the critically endangered riverine rabbit (Bunolagus monticularis) in its Karoo habitat. Dr Vicky Ahlmann manages the Group and employs members of the community to work in the first-ever Karoo indigenous plant nursery, which she and project coordinator Reda Potts have established with the aim of re-vegetating degraded riverine areas of the Karoo, the specific habitat of the riverine rabbit. The community is extremely impoverished and Vicky has taken a number of orphans into her home. In addition, she feeds and clothes other children from the community whose families are too poor to make ends meet. This she does entirely out of her own pocket. When EWT CEO Yolan Friedmann recently came back from an inspiring visit to the EWT-RRWG, she got the ball rolling on a collection for clothes, books and toys for Vicky’s little charges. Members of staff needed no second bidding and, within a month, we ran out of storage space for the donations! Then IQ Business Group, one of the EWT partners and supporters, also rallied its staff members to give to the cause and the response was overwhelming. To say that Vicky was pleasantly surprised would be putting it mildly – it was a real victory for the human face of conservation. The EWT continues to identify and assist vulnerable communities in the areas in which it works, and if this is the first community assistance project by members of staff, it’s certainly not the last. Some of our most successful interventions have been the provision of sustainable livelihood options for rural communities living next to environmentally sensitive areas. The Impopomeni Community in Howick, KwaZulu-Natal has taken our environmental education to heart and initiated a vegetable garden project. Proceeds from the garden mainly benefit a local orphanage, but also the community at large. As this is a greatly impoverished community, the EWT is appealing for donations of gardening tools and equipment for this project. If you would like to help us contribute to either of these causes, please contact Olga Chisango on .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) or +27 11 486 1102. Contact Us Today Find better ways to beat your competition. Who We Are IQ is a global provider of practical business solutions, utilising seasoned expertise and innovative tools to maximise operational and technological efficiencies. How Do We Do It? We differentiate ourselves by offering clients superior people, supported by practical, applied intellectual property. We understand business strategies and combine project management and process thinking to deliver pragmatic outcomes.