Wilderness Safaris: Proudly driving sustainable ecotourism in Botswana since 1983
Correspondent | Thursday December 14, 2017 16:41
Here are a few short facts to illustrate how Wilderness Safaris Botswana positively impacts the country, its people and its wildlife:
* 1,079 staff employed, of which 1,039 are local citizens:
* This makes up 43% of the entire Wilderness Group’s staff
* 47% of the staff are female, with 505 women employed by Wilderness Safaris Botswana, and 574 men
* There are only 40 non-citizens employed by Wilderness Safaris Botswana, from Namibia, South Africa, Zimbabwe, Ireland and England; the rest of the staff are local citizens, receiving ongoing training and employment benefits
* Wilderness Holdings’ head office is situated in Gaborone with Wilderness Safaris Botswana (also known as Okavango Wilderness Safaris’) office based in Maun
* Wilderness Safaris Botswana owns, manages and runs 26 world-renowned safari camps in the Okavango Delta, Linyanti and Central Kalahari Game Reserve, making a sustainable difference to the ongoing biodiversity protection of these wilderness areas
* All of Wilderness Safaris camps are operated with as light an environmental footprint as possible, with 12 of its camps in Botswana being 100% solar powered, namely: Mombo; Little Mombo; Kings Pool; DumaTau; Seba; Vumbura Plains North and South camps; Xigera; Pelo; Kalahari Plains; Chitabe; Chitabe Lediba
* Wilderness Safaris’ non-profit partner, Children in the Wilderness, runs the following community empowerment programmes in Botswana:
* 6 Adult Eco-Clubs
* 9 Eco-Clubs
* 88 children and 9 teachers are hosted every year on informative and fun-filled CITW camps, which are hosted at Wilderness Safaris and partner camps. This equates to 264 bed nights for the children and 27 bed nights for the teachers donated to CITW in order to run these educational camps
* Over the past five years, CITW Botswana has positively impacted over 440 children
* CITW has also been hosting YES (Youth Empowerment Stewardship Programme) Camps for 36 children each year (four selected from each of the nine Primary Schools where this programme was run). However, as the YES programme is more suited to older children, the future YES Camps will focus on targeting young adults who are out of school.
* Wilderness Safaris Botswana directly supports the following communities through high-end ecotourism:
* Okavango Community Trust (OCT): Seronga, Gunotsoga, Eretsha, Beetsha and Gudigwa; Sankoyo; Habu, Tubu, Chobe Dry and Fresh Fish Association;
* Wilderness indirectly supports another three communities: Mabele Village, Sexaxa Ward (Maun), Shashe Ward (Maun)
* Wilderness Safaris also supports ongoing conservation and research projects in Botswana in close partnership with its non-profit partner, Wilderness Wildlife Trust.
One of these projects is Wilderness Safaris ongoing Botswana Rhino Reintroduction Project which began as far back as 1999.
Run in partnership with the Botswana Government and the Wilderness Wildlife Trust, the project has seen the establishment of a healthy white rhino population in the Okavango, as well as several complex and delicate black rhino translocations.
The rhino are constantly monitored by the Botswana Defence Force and the Department of Wildlife and National Parks’ specialised Anti-Poaching Unit, with the support of Wilderness Safaris Rhino Monitoring Officers.
Wilderness Safaris Botswana
Maun