Despite the beautiful pictures of elephants with magnificent tusks and auras that take over ones' emotions when seen in person or in spectacular photos and their adorable babies, which look like they should fit in your suitcase, there is a major elephant poaching crisis in East Africa. So on February 26th, a team of 30 is either running or carrying 21 kgs (46.29 lbs) of sand in a backpack for 21kms (13 miles) to raise awareness and funds to support anti-poaching training for the scouts protecting Tanzania's wildlife and fighting poachers who are killing thousands of animals every year.
We need to help protect the wildlife populations which are being demolished and reverse the trend so that Tanzania's natural resources continue to be around for generations to come and that one of the Earth's biggest treasures, The Serengeti National Park (and surrounding ecosystem) stays intact.
The Team Name: FCF stands for the Friedkin Conservation Fund, which is a part of Ker & Downey Tanzania, which does wildlife law enforcement and community development. 5000 stands for the number of people who we are trying to get to support us in this poaching awareness campaign in 2012. The funds raised will go to scout training for the FCF anti-poaching teams. This is one of the best ways to combat ivory, as well as any other type of wildlife poaching in Africa. Put plainly, if a wildlife law enforcement team has the right tools and the right training, they have the capacity to ensure the protection of the majority of animals in their designated areas. This means that the likelihood of poachers coming in with AK 47's and firing into an entire breeding herd of ellies, killing some immediately and leaving others to die days or weeks later is lessened. Or that the likelihood of a tuskless elephant cow that is obviously pregnant will NOT be shot in order to collect the tusks of the fetus inside her. Or that the face of a 45 year old elephant bull will not be hacked off for what is essentially two teeth. There are horrendous images which 99% of the world does not see or probably want to see, but which a large percentage of elephants do see as their family members fall beside them. This team and awareness campaign that will support the training of scouts, who will support the protection of elephants is something that we have just started, but which we certainly have not finished.
So that is where my motivation is drawn from and why for the first time in my 26 years of life, I am running because I want to and not because someone is chasing me.
Uncovering the truth of elephant poaching is not an easy task....to do it professionally and safely requires well thought out approaches to expose how, why and who is involved, what markets are driving the ivory trade, how many elephants are really being taken every year (is 5000 a ridiculous number to speculate for 2011....probably not), and how do we stop it??? Lots of unanswered and hidden questions. However, supporting the training and implementation of anti-poaching is a fabulous first start and even after the marathon is over, the FCF 5000 campaign will continue.
Below are a handful of the other organizations involved in the protection of African elephants:
Wildlife Conservation Society: http://www.wcs.org/
The Pams Foundation: http://www.pamsfoundation.org/the-ruvuma-elephant-conservation-project
Save the Elephants: http://www.savetheelephants.org/
African Parks Network: http://www.african-parks.org/
East African Wildlife Society: http://www.eawildlife.org/swara
Friedkin Conservation Fund: http://www.friedkinfund.org/
African Elephant Specialist Group: http://www.african-elephant.org/
World Wildlife Fund: http://www.worldwildlife.org/
The David Sheldrick Wildlife Trust: http://www.sheldrickwildlifetrust.org/
email me for more info or questions about FCF 5000!
