4-12 September 2010
Two of the students Lyndsay worked with.
Location: Chipembele Wildlife Education Trust, South Luangwa National Park, Zambia
Perth Zoo Field Worker: Lyndsay Fairclough (Education Officer)
Last year, John Lemon, who is Chairman of Painted Dog Conservation Inc (as well as Australian Fauna Curator at Perth Zoo), talked to Perth Zoo’s Education Team about his work in Zambia assisting with the vaccination of domestic dogs in and around the town of Mfuwe. The town is near Zambia’s second largest national park, South Luangwa National Park, which is home to the endangered African Painted Dog. Vaccinating domestic dogs for distemper, rabies and anthrax, he explained, was aimed at preventing the devastating effects of the transfer of these diseases to the wild African Painted Dog population.
Transport from one of the schools to Chipembele.
While in Zambia, John met Anna and Steve Tolan, trustees and operators of the Chipembele Education Centre. John was so impressed by the work they did with children from the local schools that he encouraged the Perth Zoo Education Team to assist in any way it could. I had been planning to go to South Africa for the World Cup and decided to extend my trip to visit Chipembele as well. Although I didn’t end up going to the World Cup, I still went to Chipembele and I’m so glad I did.
The Chipembele Education Centre teaches students about the value of wildlife in and around the amazing South Luangwa National Park. The Park has a perennial river running through it which means wildlife and game can be seen any time of the year. It is also one of the few places in Africa where you can still do a walking safari and open vehicle drive. It’s one of the safest national parks to visit and a true gem of Africa. Because of this, it is attractive to tourists which fuel the town’s economy.
One of the many lions Lyndsay saw.
I spent my first week at the education centre, which is 16 km out of Mfuwe and down the river bank. It’s pretty isolated so once I was there I didn’t go back into town very much. Chipembele has two streams of activity: schools-based programs and conservation clubs. School children visit the centre twice a term and participate in a series of lessons about geography and climate of the Luangwa valley and animal behaviour.
I watched the education programs and the activities they ran and found that the resources and the content were of an extremely high standard. What they needed assistance with were the activities they ran and coming up with some new ideas. I was able to give them a few new activities and since returning to Perth our Education team has brainstormed some more new ideas for them.
Lyndsay with one of the impala at Chipembele.
The second week of my stay, I was based in Mfuwe. This allowed me to visit three of the six schools in the district and their conservation clubs. Conservation clubs are one of a number of clubs that Zambian school children are required to participate in one afternoon a week. There are also debating, engineering, AIDS and arts clubs. Chipembele coordinates the conservation clubs program for the district.
While I was with the conservation clubs, I facilitated some lessons with hands-on team-building games. One of the games was ‘habitat hoops’ where the kids learnt about threats to local wildlife, the animals in the area and some of the solutions to their survival.
The level of understanding of the English language was sometimes a bit of a barrier but there was always a teacher to translate if my message wasn’t getting through. The children enjoyed the activities even though they weren’t used to our style of teaching which is more student-centred and activity-based than the ‘talk and chalk’ style.
Of course, I couldn’t go to Zambia without checking out the wildlife. I went on four game drives and stayed at a safari camp. Animals I saw included leopard, lion, giraffe, elephant, baboons, vervet monkeys and hippopotamus. At the safari camp, my tent was right in front of a lagoon which the hippos wallowed in at 3 am each morning. The last night I was there, one was right outside my window and rubbing against the side of my tent, making it bulge in. I didn’t dare move. I also had my lunch stolen by a baboon and my breakfast taken out of my hand by a very bold vervet monkey – twice. These might sound like bad experiences but I wouldn’t trade them for anything.
Another highlight of my trip was meeting the first president of Zambia, Dr Kenneth Kaunda. He was in Mfuwe to visit Yosefe School. This school received funding from a local safari lodge, a UK NGO and Chipembele for a tree planting program which provided 665 indigenous plant seedlings, one for each child. The program also established a nursery and a wood lot that the community can harvest in the future so they don’t take from the area surrounding the national park.
Lyndsay's tent on safari. Perfect for hippo backrubs.
I talked to Dr Kaunda about my visit and he taught me the Zambian handshake. I was blown away by his interest in conservation and his involvement, since retirement, in various charitable organisations. In his speech to the students, he said he would advocate for the tree project to be replicated in schools across Zambia. The students received such a morale boost from his visit that I’m sure it was a day they will never forget.
Of course, my trip wasn’t all fun. It was confronting to encounter people’s general lack of understanding and respect for animals. That’s why Chipembele is so important, to help change those attitudes. And then there was the more personal side of missing my three-year-old daughter and my husband.
Despite these difficult aspects, this was one of the most amazing experiences of my life. I will continue to support Chipembele in any way I can as this extraordinary organisation has opened my eyes to the potential of successful in situ conservation education in developing countries.
If you are interested in finding out more about the magic Chipembele Wildlife Education Trust brings to the South Luangwa Valley visit www.youtube.com/ChipembeleWildlife.
