Sarah Maisonneuve, Founder Wildlife Connection spoke on Wednesday, August 14, 2013 at the Rotary Club of Boston #7.
The Mission of the Wildlife Connection is to simultaneously improve human livelihoods and promote the conservation of natural resources, particularly of elephants. They aim to do this by both reducing the costs and increasing the benefits to local people of living nearby elephants.Elephants are the largest land animals on earth, and have a long and complicated history of co-existing with humans. They are known and admired by many of us for the deep social bonds they share with one another, their long memories, and their extraordinary intelligence. To others, their value is measured by the almost insatiable market demand for their ivory. For most rural Africans who share the landscape with them, elephants are known above all to be extremely dangerous and destructive, where they are a notorious threat to people’s lives, and livelihoods. PhD Candidate Sarah Maisonneuve will share her experience during the past 5 years working with local communities in rural Tanzania, who struggle to coexist with elephants. You will learn about the drivers and consequences of human elephant conflict in East Africa. You will also learn about some of the novel approaches being tested to mitigate this conflict, designed to simultaneously improve human livelihoods and protect elephants. To learn more please visit: http://www.thewildlifeconnection.org/