Milking The Rhino – Screenings in Africa

Posted on January 7, 2009 by Juliana Rotich

Happy New year!

Late last year, I wrote about the film Milking The Rhino, and promised to update once a screening of the film is confirmed in Nairobi.

I am pleased to invite you to the premiere film screening of Milking The Rhino

Tuesday January 13th 2009 at 5 p.m

Goethe Institut – Corner of Loita/Monrovia Street Maendeleo House
Nairobi.

Cost: Free

The film will run for 85 minutes and there will be time for discussion following the screening. Some special guests featured in the film will likely be in attendance, Dr. Helen Gichohi, President of the African Wildlife Society in Nairobi and if possible, a representative of the Lewa Conservancy. Do join us for a discussion on community conservation, environment and film.

I will have some cool MTR buttons to hand out, and believe me, it would be well worth your evening to attend this screening.

You can RSVP on the facebook event page if you will be there.

January 28th 2009 – Accra, Ghana

EcoLab Conference
Hosted by The Society for Conservation Biology and Ecological Lab Unit of University of Ghana. MTR will be screening with a reception to follow.

*Many thanks to KikuyuMoja, Barbara Reich of Goethe Institute, Xan Aranda of Kartemquin films, William Deed of the Mara Conservancy and last but not least Jeannie Magill the executive producer of MTR for making this happen.

Do come and milk the rhino!

For info on other screenings in US and the rest of the world, please check the MTR website.

Milking The Rhino: Conservation, Community and Empowerment

Posted on October 29, 2008 by Juliana Rotich

Last month, I was very fortunate to attend the premiere of the film ‘Milking The Rhino’ at the Gene Siskel Film center in Chicago.

This film left an big impression on me. Long time readers of this blog know that I do have granola-head, green thumb, renewable-energy obsession, tree-huggery tendencies, so no surprise there eh.
Without giving too much away…the film opened my eyes to the link between Kenya’s history and our attitudes towards conservation. Before the British came, Kenyan communities had traditions around hunting wild animals (These traditions and folklore still persist – I visited Samburu in 2006 and learned a wee bit about this). I would posit that it was sustainable, because there was some balance between the hunting that was done and the populations of wildlife. When laws were enacted to forbid Kenyans from hunting…something they had been doing for millennia, that relationship with the natural world was broken. Why would one want to protect something that they are not benefitting from? Wildlife started to be seen as a nuisance. Granted that there is demand for ‘exotic’ skins, tusks, and bone from wild animals particularly in Asia; one of the factors behind poaching in the parks, there are instances of communities killing wildlife because their crops were destroyed by animals such as Elephants. Still, our attitudes towards conservation and environment bear some reflection.

The film profiles two communities, one in Kenya, at the Il Ngwesi lodge and the Lewa Conservancy, and another in Namibia. The narration is brilliantly voiced by a Kenyan Munyikombo Bukusi, a very talented guy. This film had me making plans to visit Il Ngwesi Group Ranch, if you need a place to get away and relax your cares away…Il Ngwesi lodge looks like just the place to go.

The blurb from the film’s site gives you a glimpse into the documentary…

A ferocious kill on the Serengeti… warnings about endangered species…
These clichés of nature documentaries ignore a key landscape feature: villagers just off-camera, who navigate the dangers and costs of living with wildlife.
The Maasai of Kenya and Namibia’s Himba – two of Earth’s oldest cattle cultures – are in the midst of upheaval. After a century of “white man conservation,” which displaced them and fueled resentment towards wildlife, they are vying to share the wildlife-tourism pie.
Community-based conservation, which tries to balance the needs of wildlife and people, has been touted by environmentalists as “win-win.” The reality is more complex. Charting the collision of ancient ways with Western expectations, MILKING THE RHINO tells intimate, hopeful and heartbreaking stories of people facing deep cultural change.

The film will premiere on PBS Spring 2009, hosted by Terence Howard (the famous actor – Crash, Hustle & Flow etc)
Till then, the following festivals and screenings are your best chance of watching it. If you cannot wait, you can purchase the DVD for $25.00 from Kartemquin films, just contact Xan. I would highly recommend the DVD.

Screenings:

November 2nd 2008 3pm: Chicago Humanities FestivalChicago Cultural Center

International Premiere
International Documentary Film Festival Amsterdam (IDFA)
November 2008

Washington, D.C. Premiere : D.C. Environmental Film Festival
March 11 – 22, 2009

*I will update this post if there will be screenings in Kenya. (I am asking about this and hoping we can arrange one soon)

Geo-Engineering – A Big Ridiculous Idea?

Posted on October 27, 2008 by Juliana Rotich

In the September 10th 2008 issue of the Economist, there was an article about Geo-engineering, describing the ‘Transactional Analysis’ document from the Royal scientists…
In the paper, the idea of planting trees was was ‘alluded to but not discussed’.

A second idea for scrubbing excess carbon dioxide from the atmosphere, alluded to in the Transactions but not much discussed, is to plant more trees. In principle, any old trees would do—although they die and rot, more forest cover would lock up more carbon dioxide. However, genetically modified trees might grow faster. Such trees are being developed to help the lumber, pulp and biofuel industries. But fast-growing forests could also be planted in order to capture carbon dioxide quickly.

Funny, this is the idea that seems doable yet it is not given much attention. Amongst other benefits, trees would help reclaim water catchment areas that are dwindling as we speak, and while we are at, why not encourage planting indigenous trees to enhance plant diversity?

It warms my heart when right wingers like Pat Robertson can sit with Al Sharpton on a setee by the beach, and proclaim that they see eye to eye on the climate crisis. The ads just point people to visit wecansolveit.org. A website will not a crisis avert. Granted they are are trying to create a community/movement, but that wont do much in my opinion. The ads would have been more effective if they pointed out one demonstrable action that people can take (I’d suggest urging people to plant trees) AND visit wecansolveit.org. Al, I love you, but please find a more practical way, or change ad agencies.

Planting trees; though quite obvious seems to make much more sense to me than giant rotating cylinders that create the ‘magnus effect’. It makes more sense that putting sulphur in jet fuel, flying in high altitudes and polluting the atmosphere so the sulphur crystals can reflect the sun’s rays off the earth. Don’t get me wrong, I would really like to believe that I am open-minded the big ideas put forth in the transactional paper. I do agree that the climate crisis is one big ginormous problem that threatens the future stability of the world, heck my grandma told me climate change is real. What is being done NOW to adapt to climate change? What are we doing to reclaim our rapidly deforested areas? Big questions. Yet, we can start with simple, yet obvious actions like planting trees.

In the quest to make it a cool thing to do (Gardeners and tree huggers are hardly rock stars) perhaps borrowing an idea from Joi Ito, he tags photos on his flickr stream with ‘freesouls’ How about we begin a tag ‘greensouls’ where you take a picture of someone/yourself planting a tree, upload to flickr, tag it and if you can, geo-tag it as ‘greensoul’?

Oh, if you can find a trader who can help monetize the tree planting to carbon credits, I would very much like to assuage my carbon guilt. I seem to have added it to my catholic guilt so now I have much more guilt than I know what to do with. It does not help that some friends keep chiding me about my carbon footprint.

Connecting Green Dots in Capetown SA

Posted on October 18, 2008 by Juliana Rotich

Last Saturday I had the privilege of meeting with the green bloggers in South Africa. Rafiq Phillips was the best guide anyone could ask for, a TEDster, blogger and twitterer extraordinaire I am thankful to him for showing me around Cape Town.

Blogging about the environment is a multi-faceted endeavor, because it is such a broad topic. This was reflected in the concerns brought to the table by bloggers, and when you visit their blogs, you will see that each of them writes about the environment with a different style, and that they have varying concerns. From Green building techniques and green-tech on Carbon Smart, to reviews of eateries and films on Relax with Dax…The South African bloggers have passion for the environment and are part of the ‘green movement’ happening world wide. The question I was asked was, how come the bloggers in South Africa are the most active African writing about the environment? Part of the reason is the digital divide. The internet penetration rate in South Africa is relatively higher compared to other Sub Saharan countries. We have not seen more ‘green bloggers’ emerge in other parts of Africa in as big a way as they have in South Africa (particularly Cape town) I am no social scientist, but I do hope that as internet penetration rates increase in Africa, that we have more people writing about issues relating to the environment.

We discussed the business of blogging briefly, particularly whether to accept advertising on your site, particularly whether you can do this effectively without compromising your ‘voice’. For example if you do not condone the actions of a multinational company, yet when you have google ads, their ad could appear on your site. How do you manage that effectively? This remained an open question, though Wanda of UrbanSprout suggested having control over which ads can appear on your site with whichever method of ad service you pick.

Another issue was brought up by Rafaela of greenflavour, about using blogs for environmental activism. The resulting actions such as cease and desist letters from companies that try to sue you for stating an opinion. I did mention Eff.org as a resource, and checking the Berkman Center for Internet and Society on guidance in terms of law and free speech online.

Rory of Carbonsmart challenged all of us that we need to show transformation, to show that the environmental movement is happening, and that people are thinking about their impact on the environment and doing something about it. To this end, Rory has began a mapping project called ‘Greening Africa’. The map was mentioned on an earlier post on GV enviro.

Glen of Urbansprout is considering creating a map of the information contained in the exhaustive directory of green businesses. He and Wanda created the directory from scratch and it is currently part of the Urbansprout site. It is a good resource for the many football fans flocking to South Africa in 2010 for the the world cup. Do bookmark Greenstay.co.za, as he gets this project together.

There were so many other great conversations, but the consensus was that this was the first of many such gatherings for bloggers who share a concern for the environment to meet, exchange ideas and collaborate on various initiatives. I would like to thank each and every one of the bloggers who attended. I hope that this is but the beginning of many more meetups. I left encouraged, and inspired by the environment bloggers of the Mother City.

Links to their blogs are listed here (in no particular order).

Rory Carbon Smart

Dax Relax with Dax

Glen urbansprout

Wanda Urbansprout

Cecile Dream in Green

Candice Aspirant Locavore

Raffaella Green Flavour

Tracy Capetown Oracle and EcoStreet

Update: One more link…Ian ‘GreenMan’, I have been reading his blog for years and can’t believe I forgot to include a link.

The wiki is available for future meetups and as always if there is a blogger interested in joining the Global voices team for enviro-bloggers, please let me know.

Pictures of Capetown are posted on the flickr set ‘I love Capetown’. Thanks again to the enviro-bloggers in South Africa for their time and for their hospitality.

Nairobi: Recycling center overwhelmed

Posted on September 25, 2008 by Juliana Rotich

The Karen Langata District Association (KLDA) runs a bottle bank at the Langata Link complex where residents of Karen and Langata can drop off empty glass bottles for recycling. Lately they have been receiving huge amounts of bottles and the glass company responsible for collecting these is not able to cope. They are looking for groups / organizations interested in collecting the bottles to contact them on tel. 891784 or 020-2304844.

(Hat Tip B – From Kenya Buzz)

Film Competition by World Bank – Social Dimensions of Climate Change

Posted on September 15, 2008 by Juliana Rotich

Crossposted on Global Voices.

The world bank has a call for submissions of short 2-5 minute documentaries that show the social effects or aspects of climate change. The deadline for the competition is October 24th 2008. They would like submissions from developing countries (particularly from the youth), covering any of the following categories.

- Conflict: As climate change results in scarcity of resources and economic and, in many cases, political instability, how may it lead to social unrest and armed conflict?

- Migration: Are there any links between climate change and population migration?

- Social Policy: How do governments prepare effective social policy to meet climate change challenges?

- Drylands: What is the social response in drylands related to climate change?

- Urban Space: How do climate change adaptation measures take into account the needs of the poor in the urban environment?

- Rural Institutions: How do local level institutions in agrarian societies build capacity to handle risks associated to climate change and deliver solutions?

- Indigenous Peoples: How are Indigenous Peoples responding and adapting to the impacts of climate change?

- Gender: Are there different implications of climate change for men and women, boys and girls? How or where can instances of this be seen?

- Governance: How can social accountability be promoted in climate action?

- Forests: What are the threats and opportunities for local communities in efforts to reduce emissions from deforestation and degradation?

- Human Rights: What are the human rights implications of climate change?
More information about the competition is available here.
Below is the call for submissions video.

Monday Inspiration: Corneille Ewango

Posted on August 4, 2008 by Juliana Rotich

The botanist Corneille Ewango talks about his work in the Congo to protect the forest giraffe or ‘Okapi’. He touches on the effect of the war, mentioning the mineral coltan which is used in electronics like your cellphone. Do note that coltan has fueled the war in the Congo for many years.

He also goes over his life story, which personifies courage and endurance in the face of difficult circumstances.
If you are not able to view the video, you can read a summary by EthanZ.

Pic of the day

Posted on May 6, 2008 by Juliana Rotich

This picture was taken by Adriankoto, who writes on the blog Harinjaka [Malagasy]. He is the founder FOKO madagascar initiative which has been active in planting trees particularly in rural madagascar. More on his awesome work here[English].

PS: I know i haven’t been blogged about solar energy for awhile, doesn’t mean i have lost my mojo, I am just re-charging. ha!

A Brief DEMO Redux

Posted on January 31, 2008 by Juliana Rotich

I am honored to have been part of the Africa Panel at DEMO 08 which happened yesterday. Erik and Mike did an awesome job of blogging about the sessions. My sincere thanks to Chris Shipley and Erica Lee for having us.

There were so many interesting exhibitors, you can explore a full list and find more information about the cool stuff that launched. I will highlight just a few of the products and services that stood out for me.

The first one is Green Plug – A charger that can be used for multiple devices. Their tag line is “One plug, one planet”. Think of the many chargers you have to carry with you, and when you abandon a device, that charger ends up in a landfill somewhere. The Green plug eliminates the need to carry multiple chargers. The small chip pictured here makes it all happen.

Asankya Hypermesh Network
Forget the current OSPF and BGP routing of packets, this company optimises content delivery by in their own words…

…Using a breakthrough technique for transporting packets over multiple network paths, it enables delivery of real-time content consistently and at a high quality over the Internet.

It is geared towards ISP’s and larger content delivery companies, but from their demo it seems their products could useful for those building new networks and want higher quality video delivery than is currently being offered. I thought of the now delayed EASSYproject that would have brought fibre optic backbone to Kenya…:( and to step back to something i had written last year about building network of networks, in time, it would be great to revisit how this new technology could help in low bandwidth areas or in new network systems being implemented in Africa.

Celsias
“Cooling the planet one project at a time”

Celsias is all about doing something practical to reduce climate change
On Celsias, you can read a widely-recognized climate change blog, review practical projects from all over the world and meet the coolest people who share your passion for stopping human-induced global warming. If you want to roll up your sleeves and get your hands dirty, register on the site, create a project, then recruit people or funding to get your project off the ground.

I think i may have taken too many pics, you can browse through them on this flickr set.

Script Writing Competition for Sub-Saharan Africa

Posted on December 11, 2007 by Juliana Rotich

If you know people in Radio, this would be an opportunity to pass along to them.

The Developing Countries Farm Radio Network (DCFRN) and the Technical Centre for Agriculture and Rural Cooperation (CTA) have launched the African Farmers�?? Strategies for Coping with Climate Change, a scriptwriting competition for radio broadcasters. Deadline: March 15.

The competition is open to all African radio organizations, including broadcasters, production organizations, NGOs with radio projects, and farmers�?? associations with radio shows. Submitted scripts may cover themes such as water and soil management, cropping strategies for drought-resistant plants, livestock management practices, fisheries and agroforestry, among others. Scripts must be between 500 and 2,000 words and must include background notes and production notes, in addition to references to information sources used to prepare the reports. Input from local people, especially farmers, must also be included.

More information is available at Scriptcompetition.net

Thanks Solana.

Afromusing

Africa and Beyond!

Category Archives: Environment