CERCOPAN and Claire Coulson Working to Save Zoo Animal's Wild Primate Relatives

By Claire Coulson

Cross River State, Nigeria - CERCOPAN runs a wildlife sanctuary in Cross River State, Nigeria. We protect six species of monkey, four of which are endangered. We have well over a hundred and fifty primates in captive care, and receive 30,000 visitors each year who come to see them. Our rehabilitation and education work is a means to a bigger end: the sustainable protection of Cross River’s rainforests (the oldest in Africa), and the monkeys that inhabit them.

It’s an ambitious goal, and it takes a multi-stranded approach to be successful. The starting point is Education, and our captive monkeys present an immediate opportunity. When our visitors discover that Entrance is free, even though we are one of the top tourist attractions in the area, they want to hear more.

We explain that the monkeys come to us as orphans (where hunters have killed their parents for bush-meat), or as former pets (which is illegal in Nigeria). Observation of healthy monkeys bonded in social groups presents a clear contrast, and brings a quick recognition that a monkey’s place is in the wild.

A larger educational message is that Conservation is a better option for the communities that live on the periphery of the forest. Logging only brings wealth to the barons that orchestrate the operations from the outside. Meanwhile the forests recede, and the means of livelihood for these communities goes with it. 70% of the income for many of the families in these communities comes from the harvesting of Non-Timber Forest Products, and that is sustainable. We take this message beyond our gates. We conduct programmes in over 50 schools and 2 universities, and have formed over 20 conservation clubs in the region.

Our field location, Rhoko, is within community forest belonging to the village of Iko Esai. 400 hectares of forest here are now protected from any kind of exploitation. A further 3,000 hectares is controlled to allow sustainable non-timber forest product extraction, with a ban on logging and the hunting of monkeys. The benefits to the village are made even more tangible through our Community Development efforts. We have carried out construction projects, health programmes, awareness workshops, and apprenticeships. We are completing a Community Centre as a base from which to expand these efforts. Furthermore we provide employment to 35 Nigerians, and the protected forest draws in income for the village from visiting Eco-tourists and Researchers.

Our Research programme closes the loop. Through our Biodiversity Research and Primate Research, over 9 years, we have painstakingly built up a detailed picture of the ecology of Rhoko forest, and the conditions that lead to successful primate rehabilitation. A group of Mona monkeys were released into the wild in November 2007, a first for West Africa. Plans for a second release in the coming months are now at an advanced stage.

CERCOPAN’s Mission is ‘to conserve Nigeria’s primates through sustainable rainforest conservation, community partnerships, education, primate rehabilitation and research’. All of these strands are interwoven and require us to work closely with a wide array of stakeholders, from hunters to the State Governor. Further information can be found on our home page http://www.cercopan.org/ and on our Blog site you can read about our daily battling of the odds to save monkeys, communities and rainforests in the challenging conditions of Nigeria: http://cercopan.wildlifedirect.org/