Tag Archives: Uganda

1 million camera-trap wildlife photos

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By Morgan Cottle:

1 Million Camera-trap Photos — and Counting


Elephant in Uganda's Bwindi Impenetrable Forest

Elephant photographed at TEAM’s site in Bwindi Impenetrable Forest, Uganda. (Photos courtesy of the TEAM Network)

For more than five years, the Tropical Ecology Assessment and Monitoring (TEAM) Network has been collecting camera-trap images of animals in tropical forests. TEAM started in Brazil and has now collected data on trees, terrestrial vertebrates and climate in 16 tropical forests in 14 countries across Asia, Africa and Latin America. This year, TEAM reached an exciting milestone: its millionth camera-trap image!

A gigantic African elephant, a family of chimpanzees, an elusive jaguar — these make for beautiful photographs, but what else can we learn from these images?

More than just pretty pictures, these images house important biodiversity data. By analyzing these data, scientists can learn how biodiversity is affected by climate and land-use change over time. Because the data are collected repeatedly at each site using standardized methods, we can more easily compare sites and examine changes over time. This information is invaluable to protected area managers aiming to conserve species biodiversity, which provides the building blocks of healthy ecosystems and the provisioning of ecosystem services critical to human well-being.

Although the images are “captured” by automated camera traps (responding to both movement and temperature), the protocol for setting up and collecting the cameras, processing the images and identifying the animals is an intensive process. TEAM site managers — local scientists with university degrees in ecology and biology — lead teams of technicians who set up and collect the camera traps. This often involves spending days in the field, enduring fluctuating temperatures, rough terrain and threats from dangers like falling trees and venomous snakes.

Chimpanzees in Uganda's Bwindi Impenetrable Forest

Chimpanzees photographed in Bwindi Impenetrable Forest, Uganda. (Photos courtesy of the TEAM Network)

After collecting the camera traps, the site managers review each image to identify the animals. In some locations, like the Republic of Congo, there can be upwards of 60,000 images per collection season! All of this information is then uploaded to the TEAM web portal, where it is made freely available to anyone who wishes to examine the data.

Up to now this has been primarily the realm of trained scientists such as CI’s Dr. Jorge Ahumada and colleagues, who made a media splash in 2011 with fascinating new results. However, as TEAM collects its millionth image, we are also at a critical point in providing information to the decision-makers who have a say in the management of these forests.

TEAM is now crafting indicators that will aggregate the camera-trap data and create an overall picture of the health of the animal community. These indicators can then be used by conservation managers and policymakers throughout the tropics.

For example, we are collaborating with the IUCN’s Species Survival Commission to integrate our camera-trap data into its global mammal and bird assessments. We are also working with the Convention of Biological Diversity (CBD) and the Biodiversity Indicators Partnership to propose new indicators that can inform progress of several international targets to protect biodiversity.

With new, web-based data analytic and visualization tools, TEAM will make the data more accessible and usable to decision-makers. By sharing this information, TEAM will help protect forests and species, ultimately protecting the ecosystem services upon which we all rely.

So what is the millionth TEAM camera trap image, you ask? It’s included in the GIF below. Time will tell what the presence of this jaguar could mean for the future of our tropical forests.

Jaguar in Peru's Manu National Park

Jaguar from TEAM’s Cocha Cashu site in Manu National Park, Peru. (Photos courtesy of the TEAM Network)

Morgan Cottle is the project manager of the Tropical Ecology Assessment and Monitoring (TEAM) Network — a partnership between CI, the Missouri Botanical Garden, the Smithsonian Institution and the Wildlife Conservation Society.

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Stop Ugandan gay death penalty law

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From AVAAZ:

Dear friends,

David Kato

In hours, Uganda could pass a law that could impose the death penalty or life imprisonment for homosexuality. An international outcry shelved this bill last year — we urgently need to ramp up the pressure to press President Museveni to stand up for human rights and stop this brutal law. Sign below, and tell everyone:

The Ugandan Parliament is set to pass a brutal law that may carry the death penalty for homosexuality. If they do, thousands of Ugandans could face execution or life imprisonment — just for being gay.

We’ve helped stop this bill before, and we can do it again. After a massive global outcry last year, Ugandan President Museveni blocked the bill’s progress. But political unrest is mounting in Uganda, and religious extremists in Parliament are hoping confusion and violence in the streets will distract the international community from a second push to pass this hate-filled law. We can show them that the world is still watching.

We have no time to lose. Let’s get one million voices against Uganda’s horrific anti-gay law in the next 24 hours — we’ll deliver it to Uganda’s leaders and key countries. Click here to take action, then forward this email to everyone:


http://www.avaaz.org/en/uganda_stop_gay_death_law/?bHFhfab&v=19509

Being gay in Uganda is already dangerous and terrifying. LGBT Ugandans are regularly harassed and beaten, and just last year gay rights activist David Kato (pictured above) was brutally murdered in his own home. Now they are threatened by this draconian law which could impose life imprisonment for people convicted of same-sex relations, and the death penalty for “serial offenders”. Even NGOs working to prevent the spread of HIV can be imprisoned for “promoting homosexuality” under this hate-filled law.

Right now, Uganda is in political turmoil — missing millions of aid money has embroiled the Parliament in scandal. This upheaval has provided religious extremists in Parliament the perfect chance to slip in the shelved anti-gay bill, calling it a “Christmas gift” to Ugandans.

President Museveni backed away from this bill before, after international pressure threatened Uganda’s support. Let’s build a million strong petition to stop the horrific anti-gay law again, and save lives. We only have hours — sign below, then tell friends and family:


http://www.avaaz.org/en/uganda_stop_gay_death_law/?bHFhfab&v=19509

Last time, our international petition condemning the gay death penalty law was delivered to Parliament – spurring a global news story and enough pressure to block the bill for months. When a tabloid newspaper published 100 names, pictures and addresses, of suspected gays and those identified were threatened, Avaaz supported a legal case against the paper and we won! Together we have stood up, time and time again, for Uganda’s gay community — now they need us more than ever.

With hope and determination,

Emma, Iain, Alice, Luis, Ricken, Joseph, Michelle and the whole Avaaz team

MORE INFORMATION

Kadaga wants anti-gay Bill tabled (Daily Monitor)

http://www.monitor.co.ug/News/National/Kadaga-wants-anti-gay-Bill-tabled/-/688334/1621218/-/j0h230z/-/index.html

Ugandan Parliament to debate anti-gay bill (AFP)

http://au.news.yahoo.com/world/a/-/world/15453168/ugandan-parliament-to-debate-anti-gay-bill/

Order paper Tuesday 20th November 2012 (Parliament of Uganda)

Pulling Out All the Stops to Push an Antigay Bill (New York Times)

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/04/14/world/africa/14uganda.html

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US mercenary corporations recruit child soldiers

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This video is called Ugandans flock to Iraq for security jobs – 2 July 09.

By Sybille Fuchs in Germany:

US employs former child soldiers as mercenaries

31 October 2012

The US is increasingly using private security forces to wage its wars and maintain its occupation of countries after the withdrawal of regular troops. Both in Iraq and Afghanistan, thousands of mercenaries and dozens of private security companies are being deployed to this end.

The utterly ruthless and cynical methods employed by American companies and endorsed by Washington were graphically illustrated in a German documentary television program broadcast last week. “Weltspiegel” showed how US companies were recruiting former child soldiers from Uganda to risk their lives as mercenaries for miserly pay in Iraq and other war zones.

The journalists, Marcel Kolvenbach and Daniel Satra, followed the path of young men from Uganda who were hired by Ugandan private security companies. These companies then pass them on to US firms that are commissioned by the American army to guard their camps in Iraq and other areas of the world where the United States is waging war.

In many cases, the young recruits had fought as child soldiers for the Christian fundamentalist rebel group of Joseph Kony against the Ugandan government led by President Museveni. In the course of fighting they have both experienced and committed horrible massacres.

In March of this year there was widespread media hype in the US surrounding the thirty-minute video “Kony 2012.” The video denounced the plight of Ugandan children who were used as soldiers by Kony. As the World Socialist Web Site warned at that time, this campaign was also supported by President Obama in “a cynical attempt to manipulate public opinion in favor of American intervention.”

The reality is that the traumatized child soldiers in Kony’s force are being systematically used by the US as cheap cannon fodder in Iraq. Ugandan security companies and their American partners are quite prepared to exploit the dire and traumatic situation of the child soldiers.

The Ugandan journalist Rosario Achola reported: “Most of these former child soldiers do not know how to make ends meet when the war is over. They cannot find work and find themselves adrift. So a job as a security guard in Iraq or Afghanistan is practically the only choice they have.”

She continued: “It’s ironic that the nation which expressed the most outrage about Kony and child soldiers is now exploiting these former child soldiers to fight their battles and protect them in a war which has nothing to do with Uganda.”

The young men who have learned nothing other than how to kill are required to risk their lives for a few dollars to make profits for local companies operating throughout the country. They are assured they are carrying out a safe job, but once in the field the reality is very different. Many of the returnees report of fatalities or injuries. Many are themselves injured.

On behalf of Weltspiegel, Rosario Achola interviewed Ssali Twaha, a mercenary who was told that he would be carrying out a safe mission in Iraq in the Green Zone. But then a ricochet hit his camp. He recalls: “Suddenly I heard my comrade above breathing heavily and blood dripped down on me through the mattress. It was pitch dark, I thought he had wet the bed. I wanted to wake him up. But when I touched him everything was full of blood with foam coming from his mouth.”

A US attorney reports on the case of a seriously injured Ugandan, paralyzed on one side of his body, who was deported back to his home country and then just left to his fate. “When I met him he had neither a disability pension nor medical care. He was just wasting away.” The attorney took the case to court. A further 60 victims then came forward who had suffered the same fate.

The companies that receive large sums from the US government to insure soldiers against such injuries refused to pay out. “Three of our clients have received death threats—in Uganda and Iraq. They received threatening calls such as: ‘If you do not drop your lawsuit, we will kill you.’ The attorney also reported on another injured soldier who was told by his employer, ‘If you report it you will arrive home in a body bag.’”

One security company that offered the US Army mercenaries for $1,000 per man per month was undercut by another that demanded just $400. As a result the soldiers employed by the first company were forced to return home.

The former child soldier Dibya Moses also had to leave Iraq after an illness and return to Uganda. He was dismissed without any compensation or severance pay. In an interview with Achola, he explained: “The people here are desperate for a job in Iraq because they see it as an opportunity to earn an extra few dollars. In the end it is like modern-day slavery.”

Both the US Defense Department and the State Department refused to comment on this practice. The Ugandan security contractors are not allowed to contact the US authorities. “It is a subcontractor agreement. If the US company finds out that Ugandan companies have contacted the US Defense Department or State Department then their contract will be terminated immediately,” declared an employee of a Ugandan security company. Many now fear for their jobs because the US companies are increasingly recruiting in Pakistan.

For US security firms, the hiring and deployment of mercenaries is a billion dollar business with high profit margins. The US government is prepared to pay out huge sums in order to “outsource” death and injury, thereby reducing the number of US military casualties. Journalist Sarah Stillman has established that currently in Afghanistan, more members of private security companies are killed in action than US soldiers.

A video in German about sending Ugandans to Iraq is here.

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