MATTHEW PACE:
A butterfly effect
CBC News Analysis | August 5, 2004 | More from Matthew Pace
The enormousness of the silverback astonishes you when you see him up close. This giant gorilla lumbers through the bamboo on all fours. A low, resonant growl seems to come from someplace even deeper than his massive chest. He bares long canine teeth to warn rivals of his strength. The silverback has many enemies.
The eastern lowland gorilla lives in and around one of the most biologically diverse areas of Africa, Kahuzi Biega National Park in the eastern Democratic Republic of Congo. This World Heritage site is home to the gorillas as well as elephants, leopards, crocodiles, chimpanzees, okapis, owls and peacocks. But another species is threatening life in the park.
Ten years ago, about 17,000 gorillas roamed these parts, chewing on bamboo shoots, fruit and leaves. War, deforestation and illegal mining have squeezed their habitat. Fewer than 5,000 remain.
Photo courtesy of the Houston Zoo
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The people who live in eastern Congo have struggled themselves the past 10 years. Soldiers from the Rwandan Patriotic Front marched through in 1994 chasing those responsible for the genocide in their country. Soldiers from various armies have been fighting ever since. It's hard for people to care about protecting animals when they're struggling to survive themselves.
There are those who believe the beating of a butterfly's wings in Brazil can set off a tornado in Texas. Well, events far away produced somewhat of a butterfly effect in Congo, too. And you and I played a part.
I'm writing these words on my laptop. You're reading them on yours or on your desktop. Inside our computers, and our cellular phones and pagers, is a metallic ore called coltan. It's hard, resistant to corrosion, and a good conductor of heat and electricity. Coltan is mined in only a few places in the world. The eastern Congo is one of them.
Coltan can be mined with just a shovel. So, during the technology boom a few years back, thousands of Congolese who lived nearby rushed into the park to mine the ore illegally. They had little to eat, until they started shooting the gorillas.
"What has disappeared in only a few years is a sobering thought," says Vince Smith of the Dian Fossey Gorilla Fund Europe. "The gorilla population disappeared almost overnight. It's actually quite frightening."
In the 1960s, Dian Fossey found the mountain gorillas were disappearing from northern Rwanda. The American zoologist studied them, lived among them, and protected them from poachers. In 1985, she was found murdered in her cabin, presumably by those killing the gorillas.
Still, Fossey, and those who came after, helped save that species from extinction. The mountain gorillas have thrived over the past the 10 years. Their numbers have increased by 17 per cent, in sharp contrast to their relatives in the Congo.
The eastern lowland gorilla has been dying alongside the bush elephant. In 1998, more than 3,500 elephants lived in the park. Park rangers say they've been virtually wiped out.
"Our mission was always to protect the mountain gorilla," says Smith. "But because of the decline in these populations, we had to expand."
Conservation is a difficult task when soldiers are shooting at each other. Still, the Dian Fossey Gorilla Fund has joined up with Conservation International and local chiefs to try to save the gorillas and other species. Conservation International has pledged $3 million US to set up a corridor of nature reserves. Part of the money will be used to pay local staff in an effort to better their living conditions.
"The staggering and almost immediate disappearance of the eastern lowland gorilla underscores the alarming decline of an entire ecosystem," says Juan Carlos Bonilla of Conservation International. "This joint effort represents an unprecedented commitment to preserve the region."
Smith says they also plan to allow the local communities to carry out their current illegal activities legally outside the park. Coltan mining, if managed properly, is a legitimate industry that can provide jobs in an otherwise impoverished region.
"We aim to target each of these illegal human activities and find solutions to the problems they cause," says Smith. "If the economic conditions of the communities can be improved there will be less of a need for them to find alternative sources of income within the park."
"This is not going to be an overnight success," he says. "All we can do is start the process and hope we succeed before it's too late."
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MATTHEW PACE
Freelance Writer
Matthew Pace has reported on hundreds of stories for Canada Now and the National including the 2003 Quebec election, the Netanyahu riot at Concordia University and the death of Mordecai Richler. Before becoming a reporter, he produced hundreds of stories for the CBC including the funeral of Pierre Trudeau, the Walkerton inquest and the federal election in 2000. Matthew has taken a year's leave from the CBC to live and work in Kigali. He has a masters in journalism from New York University.
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