Primatology comes to Africa

Abstract

While many forests in Africa contain some of the highest densities of primates in the world, for one week Entebbe, Uganda had the highest density of primatologists. On June 25th -30th, 2006 over 700 participants from all around the world descended on Entebbe to attend the 21st congress of the International Primatological Society (IPS). This was only the third time the conference had been held in Africa, and the first time the conference took place in an African country with indigenous ape populations. The theme of the conference was ‘Primate Conservation in Action’. The high profile nature of this conference was exemplified by two of the keynote speakers. His Excellency Yoweri Kaguta Museveni, the President of Uganda, opened the conference with a speech that ranged from the status of endangered populations of primates in Uganda, to the difficulties of ensuring that forests resources are used sustainably and the challenges of balancing the needs of conservation and development in an underdeveloped country. His speech served to focus attention of participants on the fact that the conference was being held in a country that has both one of the highest diversities of African primates as well as some of the most urgent development needs for her people. The President's opening speech was followed by Dr Jane Goodall, who without doubt inspired a great number of the audience to pursue primatology as a career. Dr. Goodall, one of only a few scientists in the world to be a widely known household name, gave a motivating talk on how primatology has grown as a discipline over the past four decades. She pointed out how the many technological advances over this period, such as portable computers, camera traps, GPS and GIS, have helped move field work forward, while at the same time field observations of individual study animals over long periods in their natural habitat remain the cornerstone of primatological methods. Indeed one underlying message of many of the talks was the importance of long term research projects. This was most evident in the key note speeches given by Drs. Tom Struhsaker and Jeremiah Lwanga, who collectively have worked on the primates of Kibale Forest in Uganda for several decades. East Africa, and Uganda in particular, provides some of the best cases of long term primate studies in the world. Given the long life span of most primates, slow reproductive rates and variability in ecology and sociality, we can only get a thorough understanding of a species’ ecology, demography, and social behavior through research that spans many decades. Long term studies of changes in primate populations can also be used as indicators of environmental change and the effectiveness of conservation actions in protecting the forests on which they depend. Many of the presentations made at the conference looked at theoretical aspects of primate behaviour and evolution. Observers from Uganda may well have been asking why these are important and how they might be relevant to the needs of people and wildlife in this country. Firstly, we must remember that scientific research, including primatology, is a global endeavour which increases our understanding of the world around us and how it functions. Pure scientific research is driven by theoretical questions and hypotheses rather than specific applied questions, and the practical benefits it generates are often unpredictable. We should not therefore necessarily expect many of the presentations at a conference such as the IPS to have direct and immediate relevance to practical management issues in Uganda. That said, research can be directly relevant to, for example, the conservation of primate populations in Ugandan tropical forests in various ways. On one end of the continuum illustrated by the talks at the conference, theoretical research on a threatened or endangered species could arguably have conservation implications simply by improving our knowledge of such species. For example, understanding the cognitive abilities of primates may not have immediate implications for the management of a population in a particular protected area, but may draw international attention, providing for example the subject matter for television documentaries which in turn can help conservation efforts through fund-raising. On another level, research that investigates primate population dynamics and ecology, while it may be primarily driven by theoretical questions, may also provide important insights to help managers understand the trends and status of primate populations, as well as their use of habitats and food resources in a given area and their role in forest dynamics, for example as seed-dispersers. Lastly, a large number of talks took the practical approach of linking primate conservation to the people who have primates as their neighbours, investigating such issues as hunting of primates and the bushmeat trade, primate based ecotourism, wildlife disease, and crop-raiding by primates. The content of the talks provided some encouraging evidence that primatologists are ‘coming out of the forest’ and conducting research with both a pure and applied approach. However, given the endangered status of most primate species as well as the pressing needs of the people who live as their neighbours, more should be done to increase the contribution of primatology to conservation. How can researchers meet both scientific and conservation interests? Finding a balance between pure and applied research to ensure the long term viability of primate populations may not appear to be easy to many academic scientists who also need to focus on obtaining grant money and publishing in scientific journals. Even where scientists’ primary research goals are of a theoretical nature, a willingness to work with the managers of the protected areas in which their study populations live can ensure a significant contribution to conservation. For example, joint prioritization of research needs with managers can help to identify studies which address both local practical and global theoretical issues. Providing reports and recommendations specifically designed for managers rather than highly technical scientific articles, as well as conducting workshops that explain the findings of research to park staff, can ensure that research results are available to managers in a form they can readily use in decision making. Regular informal contact between researchers and park mangers will increase mutual understanding of their different roles and responsibilities and allow them both to explore different ways in which researchers might be able to provide technical help to managers. An added spin-off benefit is that the long-term daily presence of researchers in a forest helps to deter illegal forest resource users. Researchers can also help to build local capacity through assistance to local students and protected area staff on research related issues. By providing information that can be used in interpretive materials, they can enhance education in schools and inform ecotourists. Researchers engaging with policy makers can increase understanding of the importance of protected areas and the wildlife they support, and lastly dissemination of research through popular media can generate publicity and international recognition. In these ways, with a limited amount of time and effort, researchers can build good relations with the managers of the areas in which they work, and help to ensure that their study populations survive in the long term. Given the importance of primatology in an African context, how advanced is primatology as a discipline in Africa? Taking a critical look at the make-up of the conference and its participants, about 9% of the talks and posters in the programme had African scientists as the lead authors (37 from mainland Africa and 8 from Madagascar). While this may seem low for a conference in Africa, it was an international conference which always attracts scientists from all over the world, and this is undoubtedly a big increase from the handful of African participants at previous IPS congresses in other parts of the world. Nevertheless, one would have hoped for a greater representation of African primatologists. In particular, there was under-representation of participants from southern, central and west Africa. That said, however, African primatologists do seem to focus on the more practical areas. While the biggest area of focus in the conference as a whole was primate behaviour, with 44% of the talks and posters, African presenters focussed more on the practical and applied subjects, with 38% focused on conservation, and another 44% on ecology and health. Only 18% of talks by African first authors were in the more theoretical fields of behaviour, genetics and evolution, compared to 52% in the conference as a whole. While much primatological research has been conducted in Africa, particularly Uganda, more needs to be done to enable more African primatologists to reach a level of scientific excellence where they can both contribute to the growing body of global scientific theory and compete on a level playing field for grant money and publication space with scientists from around the world. For the period around the conference, Uganda clearly was able to showcase its primates, their habitat and the people that are their neighbours. However, for primate conservation to be in action well into the future, much more effort is needed to show that primatology is not simply a luxury for scientists visiting and working in Africa. This will need greater efforts to strengthen the current trend of integrating research with management needs and development, as well as to build the capacity of African primatologists.