Engaging local stakeholders in transboundary conservation in the Central Albertine Rift (DRC, Rwanda, Uganda)

This is an idea that came out of 9 months of field research in the Central Albertine Rift, at the end of which a friend (Cory Wilson, founder of The Collaborative:http://thecollaborative.net/) and I filmed a series of 20+ interviews in order to produce a documentary on transboundary collaboration in a network of 8 national parks shared between the DRC, Rwanda and Uganda (this will be the second video in the Transcending Boundaries series, if you’re interested the first video is on Cory’s website).

This documentary brings together interviews with park wardens, government officials, representatives of community organizations and international NGOs to describe the history of transboundary collaboration in the Central Albertine Rift, impacts from conflict and insecurity, challenges to collaborative conservation and aspirations for the future of transboundary conservation.

Through my research it was clear that local villagers and community-based organizations were not participating in or even aware of the long-standing transboundary collaboration between protected areas authorities in this region.

The idea is to take this documentary back into the villages and screen it to local communities. This activity will serve multiple purposes: (1) to inform local communities about transboundary conservation happening right “next door”, (2) to gather community perspectives on the transboundary collaboration that is occurring and (3) to ask members of communities living on the borders of the parks how they think they can participate directly in transboundary conservation or what their role should/could be.