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Monkey business
| Date: |
29 October 2006 12:00 |
| Producer: |
Nikki Berryman
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| Show: | Carte Blanche |
As first light breaks over Kinshasa our plane bumps through the air like an old school bus, headed northeast to one of the most remote parts of the Democratic Republic of Congo. Nine hundred kilometres from the capital, it's the deep, dense heart of the Congo. And concealed under this canopy you will find one primate that is only found here in the Congo Basin - the highly endangered and enigmatic bonobo.
Jef Dupain (Primatologist): 'Bonobos are only found on the left bank of the river, compared to the chimp [are] spread over central Africa, from west central Africa to Tanzania.'
For the past nine years Belgian primatologist, Jef Dupain, has put his life on the line in a country that has been ravaged by years of civil war to better understand what makes bonobos tick. Dubbed 'the hippies of the rain forest' for their peace loving nature, they also tend to control their emotions.
Jef: 'When you talk about their emotional life, the way they see things, they think about the world surrounding them, I feel a responsibility to stand up for their rights.'
And fighting for the rights of one of our closest relatives, Jef, the DRC coordinator for the African Wildlife Foundation and his team of Congolese biologists are on a mission to protect one of the rarest of the great apes.
John Webb (Carte Blanche presenter): 'Do we have any idea, at this stage, how many bonobos are left?
Jef: 'You can find quite a lot of literature with references to numbers like 100 000, 200 000, less than 10 000, but in fact we don't know. We don't even know where they are still present in their potential distribution area.'
But Jef is inclined to go with the figure published last year in the World Atlas of Great Apes, placing the bonobo population at less than one hundred thousand. Being one of the last large mammals to be documented by science and the least studied of the great apes, Jef wanted know what makes bonobos different to chimpanzees.
Jef: '... Or understand the ecology or habitat they are living [in] created this difference between bonobos and chimps and how we can learn more about our ancestors from this.'
Bonobos and chimpanzees share more than 98 percent of DNA with humans. They are more closely related to us than to gorillas.
Jef: 'Bonobos and chimps, on an evolution level, are both as close to humans; it is not that the bonobo is closer or the chimp is closer.'
John: 'But their behaviour does differ from ours in one significant respect when it comes to resolving disputes. Rather than fighting, they have sex.'
Jef: 'That was an infant female... you saw the male who's older... the infant took some bananas, but then immediately started screaming, was stressed and afraid of the male coming to take the food, so immediately took a submissive behaviour; also presented for sexual contact, the male and female has sexual contact and he left her relaxed eating.'
Their mating behaviour is said to keep stress levels down and this 'therapy' happens in virtually every partner combination, whatever takes their fancy. Despite all this monkey business, bonobos produce roughly the same amount of babies as chimpanzees. But one of the most remarkable differences is that chimp males dominate, while in the bonobo community the females rule the roost.
Jef: 'When you talk about warfare and fighting and killing each other, human beings and chimps resemble each other very much.'
On the other hand, bonobos are the 'make love, not war' apes, but this doesn't count for much when their fate is in the hands of humans. The Congolese Civil War has been one of the deadliest conflicts in African history. It is estimated that up to four million people have died - the highest war-related death toll in the world since 1945.
John: 'But the conflict hasn't only affected humans. Effectively cut off from the outside world by the war, villagers are slaughtering the country's animals for the bush meat trade.'
Jef: 'And that is in such an uncontrolled way, little by little the bonobo population is declining and we don't know where this point will be, after which the population just might crash, and then suddenly it can go very fast.'
With at least 24 percent of the bonobo's home already under logging concessions and with more people moving into [the] forest, the escalating bush meat trade is pushing the bonobos to the limit.
Jef: 'It doesn't only have to do with conservation and biodiversity, it has to do with food security for the African people.'
John: 'I suppose the problem you face is that, because normal economic activity has almost come to a halt, [that] the bush meat trade is one of the local community's only remaining options.'
Jef: 'Ja, it was already going on in the '80s and '90s... infrastructure collapsing, less and less access to urban markets for produce and food etc. So they have to focus on something else, which are their natural resources.'
Bush meat is now the main source of protein for most people in the Congo Basin and the amount consumed may exceed one million tons a year, the equivalent of almost four million cattle.
Jef: 'If we don't find solutions, it will be catastrophic in the long term - not only for the DRC, we talk about Central Africa.'
But finding solutions is easier said than done. After studying zoology at the University of Antwerp in Belgium, Jef's research began in one of the most under-developed regions of the world. From Basankusu you spend 30 hours on a canoe, eventually arriving somewhere on the Lomako River, then it's a three hour hike through the Lomako forest - an old stomping ground for Jef, who spent five years here studying these apes in exhausting conditions.
Jef: 'Once you get into the forest and you start walking, then you spend weeks and months having your visibility limited all the time to 30 or 40 metres.'
John: 'Then of course you're also dealing with the heat, you're dealing with mosquitoes and bees apparently.'
Jef Dupain: 'If you have to try and observe bonobos sitting quietly but with bees around you, getting in your clothes, it is not so easy.'
Jef's focus was on Bonobo genetics, but [after] years of living in the forest with the indigenous Mongo people, this scientist turned conservationist; he realised the need to include the traditional owners of the forest. They survived off the land and their cooperation was the bonobo's only hope of survival.
John: 'But in 1997 Civil war broke out in what was then Zaire. Jef was forced to abandon his research station in the forest as rebel forces advanced.'
Jef: 'I didn't arrive exactly at the right time.'
John: 'So the rebels were moving across from the east and you knew that you had to get out and abandon your research?'
Jef Dupain: 'Ja in 1997 it was the group of President Kabila who took over the country and so we had to leave the forest.'
Arrested twice by the rebels, Jef has also been scarred by the war. The struggle for survival by both humans and wildlife is depicted in the highly acclaimed documentary about the bush meat trade. It follows Jef's return into the war-torn Congo Basin.
Jef: 'It was extremely discouraging. We were there for a week... no signs, just a few monkeys. No signs of bonobos. We finally succeeded in finding one bonobo party and then we were very happy that they still reacted in a very habitual way... didn't run away; we spent an hour with them.'
But they were shocked to find that the bonobo population had dropped by 75 percent over the previous four years. Jef reacted by joining African Wildlife Foundation - an organisation that implements conservation strategies that [are] a mix of science and human benefit.
Jef: 'Now when we did a survey in 2004, two years later, we found a sharp increase in density in that part, which seems to confirm the hypothesis of the local people that part of the bonobo population decided to hide away from hunters.'
This new study showed: around two bonobos per square kilometre, a clear sign for Jef that the people had decided to protect the forest.
John: 'Any particular reason why they took that decision?'
Jef: 'They know that when researchers are interested in the area they will have access again to clothes, sugar, medicine, salt, etc. and there will be basic salaries again.'
John: 'These are obviously people who have very little and one would think that, if they were looking for a way out, it would be eco-tourism. Is that something that they understand?'
Jef: 'Eco-tourism by itself, no. But if you want to find solutions then you need to find alternative ways for them to get money. We took them to parts of the forest where the forest is empty, so they understand the issue. But they also respond to us by saying: 'Well what do you want us to do now? We can't work with you in conservation when we don't have other means to survive'.'
So, together with his African Wildlife Foundation team, Jef is working to get the Lomako forest declared a conservation area. But even during our short stay in the forest, we got a taste of the complexities involved. While the chief of the area had agreed to sign over Lomako as a reserve, we were informed that the people were disgruntled for not being informed. On that note, the team left the forest without glimpsing a bonobo in a week.
John: 'We are on our way to the Lola Sanctuary, which is about a 40 kilometre drive from Kinshasa; it's where bonobos orphaned by the bush meat trade are cared for.'
Anna (Researcher): 'He was brought in on a jeep full of bush meat and he was the only one alive; they tried to sell him as a pet.'
Anna is studying the vocalisations of bonobos at the sanctuary, and she's taking care of the baby ape before he gets introduced to his new adoptive bonobo mother.
John Webb: 'Do you find that he is possibly traumatised by what he has been through?'
Anna: 'He is getting better already, but when he got in he was really, really scared. For example, if you tried to give him something to drink he would really freak out.'
John: 'I guess it is going to be a tough moment when you have to say good bye?'
Anna: 'Yes, already.'
John: 'And I think sad for him as well by the looks of things.'
John: 'Because it is very obvious when you look into their faces and you look into their eyes that they are almost human.'
Jef: 'Ja. Each time bring people who have never seen chimps or bonobos before to this place. For a lot of them an automatic conclusion is: no more bonobo meat for me any more, 'cause this is too close to us to eat.'
While these amazing primates remain shrouded in mystery, one thing is clear: unless their situation improves, they may become extinct in the wild within twenty years. And with elections just around the corner, the future of bonobos rests on a knife-edge.
John: 'Do you see a bright future for the bonobo?'
Jef: 'If not, I would not be here... the DRC is a huge country which faces a lot of problems, but there is a lot of goodwill to do something, and whilst there is goodwill we will continue to do something.'
IMPORTANT DISCLAIMER:While every attempt has been made to ensure this transcript or summary is accurate, Carte Blanche or its agents cannot be held liable for any claims arising out of inaccuracies caused by human error or electronic fault. This transcript was typed from a transcription recording unit and not from an original script, so due to the possibility of mishearing and the difficulty, in some cases, of identifying individual speakers, errors cannot be ruled out.
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