Category: Fundraising

RICHARD'S WALK FOR WATER & CHIMPS

4/19/2018

Please like the Walk For Water 100 Facebook page to follow Richard's amazing journey walking from Melbourne to Queensland!! A whopping 2,500 kilometres in 100 days!

Richard is raising funds to help us provide clean water to villages where chimps and people are both trying to survive alongside one another. In these areas, villagers and chimps come into conflict when people encounter the chimps while collecting water from forest streams. Installing boreholes (wells) in villages away from the forest not only provides residents with a clean accessible water source, it reduces the risk of potentially dangerous encounters between people and chimps: This is both a water project and a conservation project!

Last year with the help of BridgIt Water Foundation and Suubi Community Projects-Uganda we installed 3 village wells in Bulindi.

The image below shows Bulindi chimp Leila carrying her daughters, Georgia (on her back) and Wendy (on her belly), across a busy village path near a child who has dropped her watering cans in fear after hearing the chimps coming. The photo was taken before the boreholes were installed. Now, children don't have to risk meeting chimps when they fetch water!
Richard is generously raising funds to help us install village wells in areas surrounding Bulindi where people and chimps also come into conflict at forest water sources.

To support Richard's walk and help this important water project please visit:
www.givenow.com.au/bridgitwaterfoundation

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WONDERFUL NEWS!

10/24/2017

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Thank you all so much for your amazing support for the Bulindi Chimpanzee & Community Project in the EOCA European Outdoor Conservation Association public vote. We are SO proud to annouce that with your your help, votes and shares, our project received most votes in the Forest Category and will be funded!!! This award will enable us to extend our reach to cover new areas and increase our impact on the ground significantly.

Watch this space for regular updates (beginning January 2018 when the new project starts) about our activities and the impact these have for local people, the environment, and of course the chimpanzees.

THANK YOU & PANT HOOTS TO YOU ALL!!!!!

Young JACK of the Bulindi chimpanzee community.

Local kids from Nyaituma village -- one of the villages to receive a borehole with help from our project (Thanks for support from BridgIt Water Foundation and Suubi Community Projects-Uganda)

Indigenous Maesopsis seedlings in BCCP's tree nursery. With EOCA's funding we'll raise and plant 200,000 indigenous tree seedlings for enrichment planting next year. In addition, we'll plant 200,000 trees for household woodlots (providing an alternative source of wood and income) and farmers will plant 200,000 coffee trees as a 'chimp friendly' alternative livelihood -- reducing their need to cut down the natural forest home of the chimpanzees to raise cash.

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NO GREAT APES ARE EXPENDABLE

10/14/2017

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PLEASE VOTE TO SUPPORT CHIMP CONSERVATION
please visit bit.ly/VoteForBulindiChimps (we are the third project down)

300 or more wild chimpanzees cling to survival on village land in Uganda's Hoima District (https://bmcecol.biomedcentral.com/articles/10.1186/s12898-015-0052-x).
Most conservation efforts understandably focus on great apes inside government-managed protected areas. But who speaks for the unlucky 300 Hoima chimpanzees living outside such areas?

The Bulindi Chimpanzee & Community Project is a small grassroots organzation. We're devoted exclusively to finding effective solutions to conserve Hoima's chimpanzees and improve lives of people living alongside them.
We're shortlisted for a grant from EOCA European Outdoor Conservation Association. If successful, this award will provide much needed funds to support our work on the ground. Please vote for us here: bit.ly/VoteForBulindiChimps (we are the third down).

Thank you.

4-year old Rohen of the Bulindi chimpanzees.

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THE BULINDI CHIMPS PROJECT NEEDS YOUR VOTE!!

10/4/2017

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Exciting news! The Bulindi Chimpanzee & Community Project has been shortlisted for a prestigious grant from the EOCA European Outdoor Conservation Association (EOCA). It’s up to the public to decide which projects are successful!
Funding from EOCA would enable us to INCREASE OUR IMPACT SIGNIFICANTLY.
It would help us conserve three more critically-threatened groups of chimpanzees in Uganda’s Hoima District, restore their degraded habitats, and improve the lives of local residents via conservation-friendly livelihoods.

Infant Chimpanzee at Bulindi.

The PUBLIC VOTE runs from 4 October for 2 weeks.
PLEASE, please visit the EOCA site - http://bit.ly/VoteForBulindiChimps and vote for our project:
Habitat Restoration and Ecotourism Project for Chimpanzees, Uganda (it's the third project down).
And please SHARE with your friends, family, and colleagues. EVERY VOTE COUNTS!

THANK YOU!

Chimpanzee Habitat in Mairirwe, Hoima.

New baby chimps at Bulindi, Hoima

In Hoima, chimpanzee habitat is under critical pressure for development and agricultural expansion. For many households, clearing forest is their most ready source of income.
The removal of forest causes chimpanzees to eat people’s crops to survive, leading to some being trapped or killed.
The region is further threatened by unregulated, opportunistic tourism; hence, no ethical or health regulations are followed, no facilities are available, and no conservation education is available to visitors.

Our project will work with local communities in THREE NEW AREAS to develop livelihood alternatives to reduce pressure on natural forest, conserve the chimpanzees, and boost household incomes. We will establish ‘chimp friendly’ coffee farming alongside tree planting, and – at one site – help the community develop responsible, eco-friendly and educational ecotourism.

BIODIVERSITY STUDY
At one site, local community members approached us for help conserving the forest and its chimpanzees through development of tourism. We will conduct a thorough biodiversity survey (including trees, primates, birds and butterflies) and ecotourism feasibility assessment. Following this assessment, we will draw up recommendations and guidelines for sustainable ‘best practice’ ecotourism for the local community and local government.

Black & White Colobus, a primates species found in Hoima.

Coffee seedlings in the Project tree nursery at Bulindi, Hoima.

REFORESTATION, WOODLOTS & COFFEE FARMING
We will establish tree nurseries to raise and plant 600,000 tree seedlings. These will include 200,000 coffee trees to offer an alternative income source for villagers; 200,000 native species for forest enrichment planting; and 200,000 fast-growing exotics for household woodlots outside the forest.

ENERGY SAVING STOVES & CONSERVATION EDUCATION
We will construct 150 energy-saving stoves to reduce household fuel consumption and need to cut trees, and increase cooking efficiency.
We will also implement a bespoke, locally-appropriate conservation education program for schoolchildren and adults.