AHEAD Update – April 2004

Dear AHEAD colleagues-

I hope 2004 is treating you well so far.

* I should again note that if you wish to be removed from this e-mail list please just let me know. My hope is to keep parties interested in AHEAD up-to-date on developments post-Durban WPC over time, but I certainly understand if anyone wants to opt out of receiving such messages.

*AHEAD Great Limpopo TFCA Working Group: The AHEAD GLTFCA Working Group had its 3rd meeting on February 25th, in Pretoria. An updated version of the draft working concept "Sustaining animal health and ecosystem services in large landscapes: Concept for a programme to address wildlife, livestock and related human and ecosystem health issues in the Greater Limpopo Transfrontier Conservation Area" was circulated back to the group for comment on April 8th. In addition, several informal meetings on health implications for regional TFCAs have been held with SADC animal health officials, organized by the Peace Parks Foundation. If you have not received the latest AHEAD GLTFCA discussion draft ("2nd draft") and would like to, please just let David Cumming or I know. Special thanks again go to David, who continues to champion this group as it moves forward in developing what looks to be a very innovative and exciting regional initiative. We hope to have the next meeting in Maputo in May (or June- still not confirmed), with a focus on formalizing the AHEAD GLTFCA consortium and institutional arrangements, and on further delineating specific modules of the umbrella proposal.

*AHEAD Zambia: Dale Lewis reports: "Our truck is now in Lusaka loading up most of the poultry inputs and we are within a week or so from collecting our first consignment of 50 goats for selected areas around Lukusuzi National Park to offer alternative to game meat and an alternative income to poaching. I've presented our approach to conservation to two Permanent Secretaries over the past two weeks as well as to the Norwegian Amb., and the Deputy Minister for Tourism and Environment will be visiting our Lundazi trading centre end of the month. Generally, people are becoming increasingly aware of our activities and appreciative of the results. Were it not for your help, our work would be much more difficult. By the end of this year's harvest, we are expecting to exceed 20,000 snares surrendered in just three years from our farmer groups. Our poultry groups are part of the overall conservation strategy to reduce household dependence on game meat and with increased market prices and better ways of producing chickens, interest in becoming a poultry producer group is surging. Each group will be required to develop their conservation by-laws to make deliberate and conscious efforts to improve wildlife production in their area. It will be an exciting year as all this unfolds."

AHEAD Great Apes Working Group: The AHEAD Great Apes Working Group continues to work towards a suite of regional proposals related to health and people living and working with great apes in East Africa. The group, along with additional experts from other areas and programs, will be convening in May (taking advantage of the larger Great Ape conservation forum being held in Germany) with the assistance of AHEAD consultant Lynne Gaffikin, who will be helping broaden discussions post-Durban on resolving challenges at the great ape / human interface. If you have any questions, please let me know and I'll gladly pass them on to Lynne.

*CPTH Uganda: The Wellcome Trust reportedly received 147 preliminary applications for their Animal Health in the Developing World- Livestock for Life grants program, including several from AHEAD participants. In total, Wellcome has invited 37 of those applicants to proceed with a submission of a full application, including Gladys Kalema-Zikusoka of Conservation Through Public Health. We wish Gladys the best of luck in this next phase! If any other AHEAD proponents have been invited to participate in the next step in Wellcome's proposal review process, please let us know if you'd like your effort mentioned in the next AHEAD Update. Thanks.

*AHEAD Proceedings: I now have almost (!) all of the revised manuscripts back from authors (whew!), and the next phase of the editing process is underway. You may be hearing from the editorial team further over the next few months as reference formats are double-checked, etc. For those of you who have not already done so, please do send me JPEG or TIFF files of all figures that you want in your papers. IUCN has recently notified us that those are the preferred file types. Because of the delays in the manuscript revision process, I am not certain we will be able to get the Proceedings out by the end of 2004, but that is still our hope!

*Upcoming Global Biodiversity Forum for Africa: The 4th Regional Session of the Global Biodiversity Forum (GBF) for Africa will be convened from 9-11 June 2004 in Dar es Salaam, Tanzania. Under the overall theme of Biodiversity and Livelihoods in Africa: Delivering on the Millennium Development Goals, it is currently proposed that this session of the GBF address the following four issues:
1. Biodiversity Conservation, Agriculture and Food Security;
2. Securing Africa's Future: Biodiversity and Health - HIV/AIDS;
3. Managing Uncertainty: Risk and the Precautionary Principle in Biodiversity Conservation and Sustainable Use; and
4. Biodiversity, African Governance and Land Reform.
Please see the GBF website:
http://www.gbf.ch/present_session.asp?no=37&lg=EN
for more information.
Point of contact:
Dr. Laurent Ntahuga
IUCN/EARO Regional Coordinator
Biodiversity & Species
LNS@IUCNEARO.ORG

The AHEAD-related news above represents just some of the actions we are aware of, many of which appear to have come about, at least in part, from our discussions at the World Parks Congress- and your hard work, with the help of WCS AHEAD seed grants. If there are other developments to share, please let me know! All of these progress notes are helping to show our sponsors that we are meeting our objective of making the September AHEAD launch "more than just a meeting."

Thanks very much,
Steve O.