Help P.E.A.C.E Foundation with 3 volunteers for Assistance in fundraiser for translocation of Elephants

Help P.E.A.C.E Foundation with 3 volunteers for Assistance in fundraiser for translocation of Elephants

Here's a little more info about this opportunity...

In April 2018, a team from ERP, made up of ERP director Jan van Rensburg and ERP international Co-ordinator Taun Bewsher, visited an area in Southern Mozambique where we had been alerted to a large number of free roaming elephant that were potentially at risk. After arriving in Mozambique, we headed off to a local airfield, and met up with a pilot that would be showing us the area in question, and hopefully we could find signs of the elephant in question. After about an hour and a half in the air, and just as we were starting to give up hope of locating the elephants, the pilot made a banked turn to the left, and as Jan looked out of his side window, he spotted the herd. Elephant! He yelled excitedly, and we all sat up in our seats to get a better look. We circled overhead to get a count, and we verified that there were at least 27 animals in this herd, spread across all ages, from the wise old matriarch, to newborns playing around in the riverbed below. It was truly a sight to behold. Alas, as we flew a little further South, the jubilation of seeing this large and healthy herd of animals was brought to a halt, as we witnessed the threats faced by these animals. A large area, dotted with settlements, subsistence farms, and a handful of more commercial cattle ranches and pineapple plantations. A little further to the south west, a string of commercial sugar cane farms, a large village. This string of human settlement and development forms a barrier, hindering the free movement of the elephant, but alarmingly also provides a much needed source of nutritions rations on these farms, which become increasingly alluring as the natural vegetation dries out in the winter months. If these elephant remain in this area, where they are not protected under any proclaimed protected area, and faced with so many opportunities to interface with human settlement, it is inevitable that from time to time there will be human wildlife conflict, as has already been reported to the ANAC (The Mozambican Wildlife Authorities). The authorities, limited by a lack of funding and skills to carry out a relocation effort, will be forced to euthanise or cull this herd, if the complaints from the villages and farmers keep streaming in. It was immediately obvious that this was the type of intervention ERP was established for, and we decided on the spot that we should take every possible step to secure the lives of these elephant, as well as the handful of magnificent large bulls that are following this herd around. We jump right into planning for this operation. Unfortunately, as is so often the case, the best of intentions can be held up through bureaucracy and processes, and this was no exception. It immediately became clear that to get all the required permits and permissions in place, to allow us to bring Helicopters and other equipment into Mozambique, as well as complying with all the veterinary control processes, was going to take some time. More time in fact than we had available before the hot and rainy summer season would be upon us, and it would be impossible to complete this operation in 2018. We have therefore entered into an agreement with the Mozambican authorities, that they will stave off any lethal intervention from their side, until the end of April of 2019, to allow us to get everything in place to carry out an relocation for these animals. This gives us enough time to ensure that we have all the necessary permits in place, can legally get the equipment and veterinary drugs imported into mozambique, and plan or all eventualities on the ground to ensure a successful operation. We only have one chance to get this right, so it is imperative that we plan every detail perfectly. As we plan, we will be keeping a close eye on the weather and conditions on the ground, and ERP plans to action this relocation somewhere between the 24th of March and the 10th of April 2019. The total cost of the operation is estimated at around $120 000.00(US), and we hope we can rely on you to support us in this very critical cause, with a donation to ERP