In Uganda, a vibrant tourist economy boosts the conservation of endangered mountain gorillas

Bwindi, Uganda – The news of a sick or injured mountain gorilla can be concerned about local residents of this mountainous area which houses the endangered species. This is partly because most gorillas have received names, allowing rangers and others to humanize the suffering of the animal.

But a widespread interest in the protection of mountain gorillas also comes from the economic advantages of tourism that have transformed poachers into environmentalists, women married to carriers and rangers into eloquent spokespersons for large apes.

“If we know there is a sick gorilla, you see that everyone is worried.” For what? Why is the gorilla sick? What does he suffer from? “” Said Joyleen Tugume, a guid-guide to put away in the impenetrable national park of Bwindi in Uganda. “Even community people. Everyone is affected. “

TUGUME said that poaching in the park is increasingly rare because “we all work together to ensure that conservation is going well, because we all benefit”.

The UNESCO World Heritage Impenetrable National Park, a UNESCO World Heritage Site in a remote part of the South West of Uganda, is home to many groups of accustomed gorillas that have become comfortable in the presence of humans.

Tourists pay a considerable sum – $ 800 in permit costs per foreign non -resident – for the right to see gorillas in their natural habitat. An official income sharing policy channels $ 10 of each license to the local community via their elected leaders, which can invest in projects ranging from water supply to health care. Local communities are also entitled to 20% of all entry fees in the park generated each year.

Many residents, including reformed poachers living near the park, told the Associated Press that the money generated had ensured the recovery of the species, with the encroachment and poaching of declining housing while the wild authorities seek to collaborate more with neighboring communities.

Philemon Mujuni, a poacher until five years ago, said he was thinking of the gorilla once a hostile animal to kill before he kills him if he met one. As a child, he followed his father, whom he described as “a senior poacher”, in the forest to help carry the antelopes that they have drawn from the traps.

But in 2020, when the poachers killed a beloved gorilla named Rafiki, Mujuni and others formed an organization of former poachers who now say that the primates are more important than any other animal.

They serve as community surveillance dogs, in search of people who could venture into the forest to fix dubbing traps that sometimes single gorillas. Their surveillance efforts help support the work of armed rangers who also regularly patrol the park.

“When the communities’ conservation guards made us aware of us, we said:” Let the poaching in Bwindi National Park “,” said Mujuni. “I can’t go. Because, thanks to the conservation team of (Bwindi impenetrable national park), we obtain money from these gorillas that we could kill. ”

Peter Tumwesigye, one of the 128 members of the Reformed poacher group, said the gorillas are so important that people whose actions lead to the death of a gorilla should be imprisoned.

“So that others can learn and never do it again,” he said.

Many remaining mountain gorillas in the world live in the Virunga massif, a mountainous area encompassing parts of Congo, Uganda and Rwanda.

The prospects of mountain gorillas have been positive since 2018, when an investigation has shown that the population exceeded 1,000. It is a remarkable return for a species that was faced with extinction in the last century.

The International Union for the Conservation of Nature, which maintains a list of endangered species, quotes the mountain gorilla as in danger, an improvement in relation to its previous designation in danger. About half of the gorillas live in Uganda.

Besides Bwindi, the only other Ugandan park where gorillas can be followed in the wild is Mgauhinga Gorilla National Park. But this protected area has only one family of gorillas, while Bwindi has 27 groups which can be seen closely by visitors.

Primates are followed daily. Tugume, The Ranger-Guide, said that she was even working on Christmas Day. One recent morning, she led a small group of tourists in the forest, swinging a sickle to open the way and talk about the tenderness she sees in the gorillas.

“You have to fight to take over,” she said, speaking of a young man in a family of gorillas who could one day challenge the leader – known as a silver back for his distinctive coat – for mating rights.

“When you are the leader, you have all the rights to mate with women. But when you are not the leader, you do not need to mate but you can mate secretly. And if the silver back learns, then it will be a tightness,” she said.

In the offices of Uganda Wildlife Authority in Buhoma, a city outside the park, a group of guides and carriers of Ranger gathers every morning for the occasion to win generous to help tourists sail in the forest.

Groups of trackers receive allocated carriers, who can even help transport an unfit tourist on hills and through the undergrowth for around $ 300.

“The value of gorilla money is very critical,” said Gessa simply, an ecologist from Uganda Tourism Board. “It helps strengthen confidence, but it also helps awareness of the need to keep.”

___

To find out more about Africa and development: https://apnews.com/hub/africa-pulse

The Associated Press receives financial support for global health and development in Africa from the Gates Foundation. The AP is solely responsible for all content. Find the AP standards to work with philanthropies, a list of supporters and coverage areas financed at AP.ORG.