Africa-Press – Uganda. The Executive Director Uganda Wildlife Education Centre (UWEC), Mr James Musinguzi, has said human-wildlife conflict as a result of human encroachment on wild animal habitats, has led to an increase in the number of chimpanzees being attacked by people.
“We are continuously seeing the rescue of Chimpanzees on the increase, averagely we rescue two chimps every year from the hotspot districts like Hoima, Kibale Kasese, and Masindi. The more we sit and continue receiving the chimpanzees, the more challenges we face. So we must now tackle the area where chimpanzees are coming from to reduce the numbers being rescued from attacks,” he said.
Mr Musinguzi made the remarks while launching a five-year Chimpanzee Connect program aimed at addressing human-wildlife conflict in societies neighboring chimpanzee habits in Entebbe on Tuesday.
Mr Musinguzi said the program will protect the chimpanzee from attacks by sensitising people about the importance of chimpanzees and tourism.
“The program will not only help us look after the chimpanzees, but also go and carry out the intervention in the wild to have a connection with the people, create awareness in order to reduce on the numbers that are going to chimpanzee sanctuaries,” he said.
Mr Musinguzi said there is a need to construct more chimpanzee sanctuaries to cater for the increasing number of chimpanzees rescued from human attacks as the current two sanctuaries have exceeded their capacity.
“At UWEC we have 22 chimpanzees, Ngamba Island chimpanzee sanctuary has 50 which is our capacity. This implies that if more chimpanzees are rescued as a result of human-wildlife conflict, we have no place to take them” he said.
The Manager of Education and Information Department at UWEC Mr David Musingo said the increased destruction of the forest cover where the chimps reside, has led to an increase in human-wildlife conflicts.
“We are losing 70percent of our forest cover especially in western Uganda like the Bunyoro region where chimps reside. We need to replicate the conservation education programs carried out at UWEC and Ngamba sanctuary on primates in our societies so that chimpanzees can be protected by the people instead of harming them,” he said.
The executive director Ngamba Chimpanzee Sanctuary and Wildlife Conservation Trust, Mr Joshua Rukundo, said the chimpanzees are now classified as endangered species according to the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) due to human-wildlife conflict and illegal wildlife trade in the species.
