A few external events

Here's a round-up of a few external events we thought our readers might be interested in:

Gaia Foundation

• 15th Sept - The life and vision of Thomas Berry
• 15th-16th Sept - Thames Festival 2007
• 19th Sept - Gaia Evening with Andrew Kimbrell

More detail at http://www.gaiafoundation.org/

Resurgence

Four events on Climate Change:

1. 19 September - The Economics of Climate Change: What is the best economy when the climate is changing?
2. 7 November - The Politics of Climate Change: developing an all party approach to mitigate global warming
3. 16 January 2008 - Food and Climate Change: How food production and consumption needs to change
4. 2 April 2008 - Businesses and Climate Change: how corporations and businesses should adapt to the need for climate stability.

More info at: http://www.resurgence.org/events/

'Wild Laws' - Article in today's Guardian

Interesting article in today's Guardian on the 'Wild Law' concept:

"The term "wild law" was first coined by Cormac Cullinan, a lawyer based in Cape Town, South Africa. Put simply, it is about the need for a change in our relationship with the natural world, from one of exploitation to a more "democratic" participation in a community of other beings. If we are members of a community, Cullinan says, then our rights must be balanced against those of plants, animals, rivers and ecosystems. This means developing new laws that require the integrity and functioning of the whole Earth community to be prioritised. In a world governed by wild law, the destructive, human-centred exploitation of the natural world would be unlawful." - Full story here...

The Gaia Foundation also has an article by Cormac Cullinan, (first published in Resurgence).

This also led us to learning more about the upcoming events by the UK Environmental Law Association which may be of interest:

• Wild Law one day conference Nov 10th
• Nicholas Hurd MP will talk to the Climate Change Working Party on 23rd Nov
• Stephen Tromans will provide an update on environmental law in Bristol on 28th Nov
  - On the same day in London the newly formed Corporate Due Diligence Working Party meets.
• Talks on nature conservation will be given in Cardiff on 30th Nov.
• The Garner Lecture 2006 by Malcolm Forster will be held on 13th Dec.

Learn more about their events here: http://www.ukela.org/events.shtml

The Wilderness Foundation will be at Resurgence - Saturday 16th September

If you are attending the Resurgence event Saturday the 16th of September, come and see us at our stand where you can learn about:

• Our trails in the UK and Africa
• Our campaign work - including wind farms
• Our upcoming events including an evening in partnership with Save China's Tigers
• How to support us and how to join us

We hope to meet you there!

BBC Radio 4 - Alaskan Wilderness on Excess Baggage

Today's edition of the weekly Radio 4 programme Excess Baggage had a journalist from the Scotsman on the panel who shared some of his experiences of Alaska:

Guy Grieve gave up his office job at a Scottish newspaper to spend a year alone in the Alaskan wilderness. Once in Alaska he cleared trails, built a log cabin, coped with dehydration, survived temperatures as low as minus 60 degrees, came close up to black and brown bears and trained a team of dogs. He wrote the story of his adventure in a book entitled Call of the Wild.

The most recent World Wilderness Congress was of course also in Alaska, and whilst we're in that corner of the globe, this Live Grizzly Bear Cam from National Geographic may be of interest if not entertainment: "Watch the world's largest gathering of brown bears on a live Webcam‚ as grizzlies at Alaska's McNeil River Falls fish for salmon on the run".

New BBC Radio 4 blog - Planet under threat

BBC Radio 4 has launched a new blog that may be of interest:

"It's part of a new series called Planet Earth Under Threat, which will go out at the end of the year. The programme team share their experiences as they go on location and they want to know your views, whether you're a committed environmentalist or a climate change sceptic."

http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/planetearthunderthreat/

BBC Radio 4: The Last Great Wilderness

Just in case you missed 'The Last Great Wilderness' on Radio 4:

"Less is known about the forest canopy than the depths of the poles, yet the forest canopies are thought to house 40% of all terrestrial biodiversity and are the main interfaces between life and the atmosphere. Up until recently the canopy has been relatively inaccessible but now, with the help of giant cranes with low environmental impact, the canopy’s secrets are being unveiled. The Last Great Wilderness builds up the first accurate picture of this “the most important biotic regulator on earth”. Flora, fauna and the relationship with the atmosphere are all under scrutiny. Many species, systems, and relationships of the canopy are still mysterious and much is still to be discovered." - Full story here, with Listen Again link to Programme I and II...

The Foundation's focus is usually at ground level but we encourage sensitive exploration of all wilderness areas for preservation purposes.

uMzi Wethu Training Centre Press Coverage and Premier Speech

From The Herald today:

"PREMIER Nosimo Balindlela yesterday launched the first uMzi Wethu Training Centre, which is aimed at equipping Aids orphans with the skills to work in the booming eco-tourism industry.

The initiator of the project, the Wilderness Foundation, says there are more than 800 000 Aids orphans in South Africa, and about 80 000 child-headed households resulting from the disease in the Eastern Cape alone."

http://www.theherald.co.za/herald/news/n20_21042006.htm

You can read Eastern Cape Premier Nosimo Balindlela's full speech here.

Read more about the project here (and below) - If you're based in the UK and would like to support the project, get in touch - 08081786931

Umzi Wethu Training Academy for Displaced Youth in South Africa

The much anticipated Umzi Wethu (Xhosa for “our home”) Training Academy opened in Port Elizabeth, South Africa 20 April 2006.

This ground-breaking project has been developed over the past three years by the Wilderness Foundation South Africa (WFSA). WFSA has led a consultative process bringing together experts from a wide range of specialist areas to address the enormous issue of youth orphaned by the HIV/AIDS pandemic and devastated by poverty. Professionals in child clinical psychology, youth welfare, and education, and local community groups and game reserves came together to develop a program that will enable displaced youth to learn life and employment skills enabling them to participate in the growing ecotourism industry of South Africa’s Eastern Cape Province.

The Eastern Cape is an area of very high biodiversity and great wildlife carrying capacity, and ecotourism is growing at a pace of 10% a year. Its 29 parks and 20 private game reserves are generating jobs that on average pay twice minimum wage but demand skilled labor. However, the AIDS pandemic is having a big impact on Eastern Cape (EC) ecotourism potential. HIV/AIDS hits people in their most productive years of life. About 3% of the EC Parks Board staff is lost each year to HIV/AIDS. In the hospitality industry as a whole, it is estimated that 24% of staff are HIV-positive – the highest ratio in an industry, next to mining. Yet to date the tourism and hospitality industry has not collectively addressed the HIV/AIDS pandemic. Umzi Wethu will provide the certified vocational training and learnerships (internships) that qualify AIDS orphans and vulnerable youth for guaranteed jobs in private game reserves and parks, secured by WFSA partnerships.

The Eastern Cape Premier, Nosimo Balindlela, has recognized the unique contribution of this program and has become its official patron. She opened the skills centre and residential academy with a moving speech, describing Umzi Wethu as a “visionaryproject which will use our natural resources in a sustainable way to help young peoplecope with the way HIV and AIDS has affected their lives.” This underscored the WFSA belief that experiences in wild places have the power to transform and that theresponsibility for the future of our environment rests with the youth of today.

The launch reception was held at the newly renovated Umzi Wethu building. It was attended by:

· Nomsa Jajula, Provincial Minister of Health for the Eastern Cape, and Christian Martin, Provincial Minister of Public Works for the Eastern Cape. Both expressed an interest in working with the Umzi Wethu project moving forward.

· Ubuntu Education Fund, a township based community organization helping to select and counsel the Umzi Wethu youth.

· Africa Global Skills Academy, a firm designing the Umzi Wethu course that will ensure that all youth acquire three National Qualifications Framework (NQF) certificates during the program, and also receive some of the life skills training so essential for the adjustment necessary to undertake full time employment.

· Local game reserves committed to employing the trained youth.

· The Eastern Province Youth and Child Care Centre that helped WFSA secure the Umzi Wethu facilities and advised WFSA on youth care and social welfare issues.

· The Black Managers Forum, a network of successful business people expressing interest in participating in the mentoring program for Umzi Wethu participants.

· Contributors to the project including architects, advisors, private funders, potential sponsors, local businesses and other organisations who are keen to be involved with the Umzi Wethu project. As a result of the launch, funding was received from Volkswagen South Africa to outfit the residential academy with furniture, and WFSA continues to seek local and international donor support.

· WFSA board members from the United States and United Kingdom, as well as South Africa.

Timing of the event allowed 9 of the 15 youth selected for the first program phase to participate in the launch activities, experiencing their first opportunities as hosts. Dressed in matching Umzi Wethu t-shirts and trousers, they looked like any ordinary teenagers, hiding the fact that all have led very tragic lives, losing their families to the scourge of AIDS and growing up in town-ships with no hope or opportunity to realise their dreams.

Many of the speakers on opening day addressed the Umzi Wethu youth personally during speeches, charging them with added determination to succeed in their new career paths. The students were fired up about the facilities and services that were to be provided for them and expressed a keen desire to make the most of the opportunity that Umzi Wethu will bring. They shared their excitement about being able to financially provide for their extended families once employed in the promised secure job in an EC park or game reserve.

A reception with food and drink was then held in the newly renovated residential academy which will eventually be a home base for about 36 youth. The first intake of students is now settled into the new residential academy and undertaking their initial training courses. Within days of starting the program, for the first time in their lives, the students are beginning to dream about real possibilities.

Changing lives…for a better future through conservation.

Read more about the project here - If you're based in the UK and would like to support the project, get in touch - 08081786931

Thesiger photos on-line

Thesiger took thousands of photographs on his travels, some one hundred of them can be found at the University of Oxford's Pitt Rivers Museum.

New biography on Wilfried Thesiger

There is a new biography of one of the Wilderness Foundation's late patrons, Wilfried Thesiger - it has been reviewed in The Times by Ben Macintyre, who on a previous occassion when writing about Thesiger observed that:

You have to be an oddball to want to plunge into malarial swamps.

Indeed.

Also in The Times, Philip Marsden observed:

There is no doubt that Wilfred Thesiger was one of the most remarkable figures of his generation. He was a man who conducted his life in fierce and unfaltering pursuit of a single ideal. He travelled without concession to his own physical needs or safety in some of the most remote and dangerous places in the world. He did it almost continuously, for more than 40 years. From an initial pioneering expedition to the Danakil desert in the 1930s through to the 1970s, he was rarely still. He conducted countless, months-long treks in Morocco, Yemen, Iran, Kenya, the Himalayas, Ethiopia. He lived for two years in Darfur, five years in Arabia and seven years among the Marsh Arabs of southern Iraq. – The Article can be found here.

Other reviews in Country Life, The Independent etc.