Baraza

Enthusiasm abounds as the big yellow truck once again returns to South Africa on a mission to help a number of primate sanctuaries and conservancies.

Since its debut expedition in South Africa last year, The Great Primate Handshake arrive having extended this year’s expedition through both Kenya and Uganda with great success, helping create an array of digital media for organizations such as the Colobus Trust, Sweetwaters, Jane Goodall Institute, Ugandan Wildlife Education Centre and Ngamba Island.

Making all this happen is a small team of dedicated conservationists, from lecturers and anthropologists to designers and industry professionals, all who donate their time and money to guide and help volunteers in learning the skills required to produce digital content for conservation efforts in the field.

With a heavy dose of planning and ‘handshaking’, to ensure that all the content produced is of actual benefit and specific to the sanctuaries’ needs, the teams produce films to improve education and raise awareness, interactive software for websites and content for the XO laptop (from the ‘one laptop per child’ project (OLPC)), before handing the finished product over for each organization to use as and when they wish.

As for the South African expedition, the new group of volunteers arrived last night at the Klip Kop reserve just outside of Johannesburg, eager to begin their training before heading off to look at supporting education projects at JGI’s Chimp Eden, the first stop on this expedition.