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Thursday, 2 May 2013
Victoria Falls Hotel identifies Rose of Charity Orphanage as part of community responsibility
As part of their community responsibility, The Victoria Falls Hotel has committed to assist The Rose of Charity Orphanage based in Victoria Falls. The main project of assistance will be in various forms which include donation of linen and creation of a worm project and vegetable garden at their new site. The Hotel will then also assist with the general upkeep of the home.
The home currently has 70 orphans with the youngest “Owen” aged 2 years. As an expansion of the Hotel’s Sustainable Tourism Program, the Victoria Falls Hotel team is assisting with the setting up of a worm farm and garden at their new site near Mpisi Village.
In line with the successful project that has been running at the Hotel for the last year, the wings continue to grow and The Rose of Charity was identified as an opportunity to spread recycling and sustainable gardening projects to children to get the concept starting at a tender age.
Experience derived from the Hotel team will be used to create a viable organic garden and enable the orphanage to have a variety of vegetables for their consumption and income generation.
With refurbishments currently underway at the ‘Grand Dame’, bed linen, towels and pillows have been donated to complement other donor’s that have been assisting the Home with bedding.
The Victoria Falls Hotel Peer Educators Club made up of staff members from across all departments will also work together with the home in HIV/AIDS activities, presentations and awareness programs along with pledging to providing manpower for the brick making process for the new home.
Links:
Zambezi Traveller Victoria Falls Hotel Directory Page
Rose of Charity
Zambezi Traveller iPad App
Zambezi Traveller is proud to announce that the latest issue of the Zambezi Traveller (Issue 12, March 2013) has just been released in the App Store as a free download for iPad, with a new feature - live news feeds. Download your copy now and enjoy the beauty and wonder of the Zambezi region. Links to products and conservation organisations are all available on this informative and beautiful format.
Visit the App Store Zambezi Traveller page here.
Let’s dance! Introducing Mwedzi Muchena – the Clear Moon Arts Ensemble, Victoria Falls
UP: How do you choose the dances for your repertoire?
SC: We want to give people an idea of our traditional Zimbabwean culture, and there is a dance for almost every important occasion: A hunting dance, a war victory dance and – of course – a lovers’ dance.
UP: And the name of your group?
PK: We call ourselves the Mwedzi Muchena Arts Ensemble. Mwedzi Muchena means ‘Clear Moon’.
SC: Because nights with a clear moon are nights for celebration.
UP: Tell me more about the ensemble.
SC: We have been together for about a year, but all of us have been involved with traditional dancing and music before.
PK: Most group members have known each other a long time. But some new dancers have just arrived from Harare. That means extra rehearsals...
UP: The instruments you feature …
PK: Our drums are the driving force. They power our dancing and make people move …
SC: And then we have the mbira for the quieter moments. The mbira is a very old and spiritual instrument. We think, especially our foreign guests should see it, hear it and know about it. This instrument is traditionally used for communication with the spirit world.
UP: But how about this world in the here and now? Can you make a living with the work you do?
PK: It is very hard, and we are not quite there yet. I give drumming lessons and do fire shows as well. Sometimes I teach gymnastics or help other artists with their training.
UP: Pardon, I think, I have seen you on TV!
PK: (laughs) Yes, together with a friend I was hired to do a fire show for a German production called Million Dollar Model. We were breathing fire and juggling with fire for a whole day while the models were posing for the cameras.
Read the full article here.
Where do the Zebra go?
Zambezi Traveller, Issue 12, March 2013
Highlights
Cover story:
Where do the Zebra go?
Written by Kelly Langden of Elephants Without Borders, we look at the recently uncovered migrartion routes in Botswana.
Linked stories:
Findings reveal critical wildlife corridors
Zebra Without Borders
Cahora Bassa & Tete
Tete’s historic forts
Rare orioles and shy elephants (Gorongosa National Park)
'Senduana’ serpent of Songo
Chobe
The hidden value of basket craft
On the Old Hunters’ Road
History of Chobe National Park
An elephant-size problem
Okavango
The Botswana Predator Conservation Trust
Maun Animal Welfare Society
Harare
Tracking and saving pangolin
Kariba and Middle Zambezi
Crayfish invasion worries experts
Kariba floodgate to open
Painted Dog, fast and efficient predators
Zimbabwe wetlands incorporated into RAMSAR
Wetlands and RAMSAR
A confusion of stripes
Bulawayo
Eagle study holds world record
The Black Eagle Breeding Survey
History written in stone
Victoria Falls
Luxury cruise boat due in May
Chasing rainbows in the spray
Mantis to manage Rani property
Batoka Gorge Dam: to be or not to be?
Russell Gammon: Bringing history to life
Introducing Pioneer Camp
World class accolades for Elephant Camp
Birds-eye ‘Canopy Tour’ launched
‘Let’s make this work’
Rolling out the green carpet
Portrait of a pangolin
Hwange
Why travel when it rains?
The secrets of Hwange’s zebra
The Long Shields lion guardians
Still fit for a Queen, Sable Sands re-opens
Kafue
Zambia’s endemic lechwe
Livingstone
New wings over Western Zambia
Relationships make the destination
Encouraging creativity
The dream to open up Africa
Slavery – the scourge of Africa
Berry banquet
Wonders of an African childhood
Planning to re-green a country
Hell and high water
Are they praying or preying?
Luangwa
Valley to Valley
'The Long Shields' - lion guardians of Hwange
The lion is an iconic symbol of Africa, yet co-existing with lions poses hardships for many African communities. Lion depredation on domestic livestock and has negative impacts on the livelihoods of livestock owners. Carnivores are impacted when retaliatory action is taken against them.
Globally, human populations are expanding and this has resulted in increasing human-carnivore conflict and declines in many carnivore populations across the world. In the case of the African lion, populations across Africa are shrinking and lions are now absent from 85% of their historical range.
Great ingenuity, dedication and the will and support of local communities are needed to solve the problem of human wildlife conflict. The ‘Living with Lions’ project in south western Kenya has hit upon a unique solution. Maasai warriors were recruited to work alongside conservationists to protect both their community’s livestock and the predators in their areas.
This ‘Lion Guardian’ programme has enjoyed significant success in reducing human-lion conflicts. Following the notable achievements of the Kenyan programme, a number of similar projects have been initiated in community areas across Africa, including Ruaha and Ngorongoro in Tanzania and around Hwange National Park, Zimbabwe.
The Hwange programme has been named the ‘Long Shields’ and is run by the Hwange Lion Research Project with sponsorship from Panthera, Great Wall Motors and SATIB Trust. The programme name has local resonance; in the late 19th Century the Matabele were known as ‘the people of the long shields,’ so named because the fearsome warriors of the tribe carried tall rawhide shields for protection in battle.
Our modern usage of the name communicates the protective role that the contemporary Long Shield officers play in their communities, protecting both village livestock and their community’s natural resources, including the predators that are so valuable to Zimbabwe’s tourism industry.
In late 2012, after fruitful discussions with the Tsholotsho and Hwange Rural District Councils, CAMPFIRE officers and local traditional leaders, the programme was launched around Hwange National Park. The programme is led by the Hwange Lion Research Project’s Brent Stapelkamp and Lovemore Sibanda and has, over the last few months, recruited seven men and one lady from candidates put forward by the local chiefs.
Each Long Shield is equipped with a rugged mountain bike (donated by Des Stephens of SATIB insurance), a cell phone to communicate with project co-ordinators and GPS to record information about conflict incidents in their area. As fearless as the warriors of old, the Long Shields actively mobilise villagers to deter would-be stock raiding lions with loud noises and bright lights and by lighting watch fires.
They also warn their neighbours to move their cattle away from areas where lions are present. This strategy appears to work well and we have monitored the movements of these lions as they move back into the National Park to avoid this unwelcome disturbance. The Long Shields also monitor local wildlife, assist and advise local people with livestock protection.
The Long Shields lion guardian programme is part of ongoing long term research being undertaken by the Hwange Lion Research Project in close collaborative partnership with the Zimbabwe Parks and Wildlife Management Authority.
Since 2007 the project has focused on understanding the causes and extent of human conflict with lions in the Hwange area. This programme has been extended to the Victoria Falls region in partnership with Roger and Jess Parry of Victoria Falls Wildlife Trust.
Links:
WildCRU
Download latest Zambezi Traveller online
You can download a pdf version of the latest issue of the Zambezi Traveller, as well as many back issues, on our website here
Batoka Gorge Dam: to be or not to be?
At the end of 2012 the Zambezi River Authority invited expressions of interest from companies interested in tendering for the development of the Batoka Gorge Hydro Electric Scheme, a joint initiative by the governments of Zambia and Zimbabwe and supported with funding from the World Bank. Sources expect the project to commence this year and reach completion by 2019.
Details of the proposed dam design were summarised in the invitation document as being a 181m high gravity arch dam with two underground power stations carrying four 200 MW turbines and giving a total capacity of 1,600 MW.
The reservoir formed by the dam will be contained within the Batoka Gorge and is predicted to have a relatively small surface area of 26km2 and a water level of 762m above sea level. The location for the dam on the Zambezi River 54km downstream of the Victoria Falls is given as 18º 1’ S 26º 34’ E.
Zambezi River Authority chief executive officer, Engineer Munyaradzi Munodawafa, was reported by media sources as saying that the Batoka project was expected to have a positive socio-economic impact on people from the two countries. “We are looking at the economic benefit locals are going to derive from the project,” he was quoted as saying.
A few months prior to the announcement of the tender process an American hydrologist criticised the proposed plans for the Batoka Gorge Dam and Mphanda Nkuwa Dam (also on the Zambezi in Mozambique) for being based on archived hydrological data which had not been re-evaluated for potential climate change risks, including regional drought, reduced flows and increased risk of extreme flooding events. The original technical, legal and environmental feasibility studies were carried out in the early 1990s.
Zambia’s power utility managing director, Cyprian Chitun, said fresh technical and environmental studies will be conducted before the actual construction begins. “An expression of interest was tendered in the press to look for consultants to review the study that was conducted in 1992. We need to ensure that the feasibility study is brought up to speed,” local sources reported. ZRA public relations and communications manager, Elizabeth Karonga, confirmed the authority was waiting for a new updated Environmental Impact Assessment report before commencing construction of the dam.
In January 2013, ministers from Zambia and Zimbabwe met in Victoria Falls to discuss the development of the project.
FACTFILE: History of the Batoka Gorge Dam project
The first geological studies of the Batoka Gorge were undertaken in 1904 with the construction of the Victoria Falls Bridge and planning for the Victoria Falls Hydro Electric Scheme. The bridge was opened in 1905 but the power scheme was not realised until 1938.
The Batoka scheme was conceived in 1972 out of a study instituted by the Central African Power Corporation (predecessor of Zambezi River Authority). The 1972 report by Sir Alexander Gibb & Partners identified several sites on the Zambezi which would be potentially suitable for development as hydro electric schemes. These included Batoka Gorge, Devil’s Gorge, both upstream of Lake Kariba, and Mupata Gorge, downstream of Kariba. The 1981 Gibb report relocated the proposed dam site some 12km upstream, due to a mapping error. The current technical, legal and environmental feasibility studies were carried out in 1993.
Early in 2012 the governments of Zambia and Zimbabwe agreed the settlement of outstanding debts relating to the Kariba project, clearing one of the last major obstacles to the Batoka project.
Read about the Batoka Gorge Dam in the March 2012 issue of the Zambezi Traveller:
Batoka Gorge Power Scheme Revisited
Read more on the Batoka Gorge Dam in the July 2012 issue of the Zambezi Traveller:
Batoka gorge dam one step closer
Zambezi Traveller - in print and online
The Zambezi Traveller - The Travellers Friend, is a definitive guide for destinations along the zambezi river. It is distributed world wide to travel agents, industry shows, hotels, lodges and key public areas throughout the region, including capital cities. Travel the Zambezi - Botswana, Mozambique, Namibia, Zambia and Zimbabwe.The Zambezi Traveller team are proud to announce the launch of the Zambezi Traveller iPad App. View the latest issue on your iPad - interesting stories supported by beautiful visuals (slide shows), links to the websites of top class safari lodges, conservation organizations and local businesses are all available on this beautiful and informative App.
The Zambezi Traveller now offers :
- Full colour, high quality, popular tabloid newspaper. 25,000 copies printed quarterly and distributed regionally into hotels, lodges, boardrooms and key public areas as well as to travel agents and travel shows worldwide. In 2013 the Zambezi Traveller tabloid will be printing 30,000 copies quarterly to meet the huge demand for this publication. A pdf version of the Zambezi Traveller can be downloaded online from our website.
- An informative website useful for travellers and agents alike. Read key features and articles from the latest issue, browse our archive of articles and interesting stories, search for local travel information, visa requirements, medical and other important information. Explore our directory of local accommodation, tour and travel operators. Download pdf versions of current and back issues of the Zambezi Traveller.
- iPad App – explore the latest issue of the Zambezi Traveller through this easy to use and visually stunning medium.
- Quarterly e-newsletter which anyone can subscribe to via the website. This offers advertisers an opportunity to market specials, and subscribers to have update news on product launches, new businesses, events as well as numerous conservation and community projects that take place in the area. The latest newsletter will be published later this week.
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