2022 Challenges & Achievements - End of the Year message from Coe, Victory & the Nsefu Wildlife team!
Merry Christmas and Happy Holidays to all of our wonderful friends and supporters.
Dear friends,
On behalf of all of us at Nsefu Wildlife, we wish you and yours a Very Merry Christmas and Happy New Year. Happy Holidays to ALL!! We are incredibly grateful for your friendship, your guidance, and your continued support. This foundation would cease to exist without YOU...our wonderful friends.
In 2022, Nsefu Wildlife has had victories, challenges, and we suffered the loss of a dear friend and original supporter...the wonderful Judy Wheatley. I wish I could say that the world has stabilized since our last holiday newsletter and that donations have improved... but sadly I cannot. It has been a very difficult three years with the lingering effects of COVID and the global economic and political crises we find ourselves facing. Inflation has dramatically impacted the financial stability of foundations worldwide...ours included. 2023 will see us making difficult changes within our programs as we try to match our size with our funding to keep Nsefu on the ground saving wildlife. These moves are imperative to keep us going and we pray we will see more stability in 2023, but we are battening down the hatches till then. Please keep us in mind with potential supporters, sponsors, and friends who want to be part of a pioneering antipoaching foundation creating dramatic change in Africa. Poaching has escalated worldwide due to financial hardships and greedy criminal syndicates. Our job is 24/7... 365 days a year. Extinction doesn’t take a day off.
Despite our economic challenges, our foundation continues to wow everyone in the Nsefu Sector and beyond. This year we had the successful Grand Opening of the Bonnie Dines Women’s Center made possible by our wonderful friend and supporter, Gary Dines. We were fortunate in that some Nsefu Wildlife supporters from San Diego were on hand for the fun. Senior Chief Nsefu oversaw the festivities, local officials and the entire community came out in force for the event, and it was a smashing success. This new building is the new “hub” of Kawaza village on the outskirts of Mfuwe and we are incredibly proud of it and what it represents for our vision for Nsefu. This building houses our successful women’s sewing program and this is the first year of our new school uniform program. Kids in Zambia wear school uniforms K-12. This program will help generate much-needed funds for our other programs...like supporting our Nsefu Wildlife Ranger Team.
Nsefu Wildlife looks to create income-producing programs that can support other important parts of our foundation. Another successful program we run is the Beekeeping/Biofencing program. This year we saw the extension of our biofencing line which protects fields and crops from marauding elephants. This pioneering program created by Dr. Lucy King has successfully reduced the Human/Elephant conflict in the area and we look to expand it further in the sector. A great byproduct of using beehive fencing to protect crops is that farmers get to sell the honey produced by the hives...so everyone wins. We hope within the next 2 years to have our “Bee Farm'' underway which will basically be a honey-producing program that will help generate income by the sale of honey in the region and beyond, and will also serve as a trade school for locals wanting to learn beekeeping.
The Nsefu Wildlife rangers have been working hard on the ground with the Department of National Parks & Wildlife (DNPW) protecting wildlife in the game management area (GMA) and within the South Luangwa National Park. We have had successful operations arresting poachers and collecting contraband and weapons. Our presence in the sector is an excellent deterrent against poaching and trafficking. Furthermore, the ranger team was honored by Senior Chief Nsefu in that they were requested to be his “personal security'' for his annual event in which he travels the Chiefdom with the event ending at the stadium in the area with officials from all over Zambia. The chief is greeted and celebrated by thousands of Zambians and it was simply amazing to be part of. To be chosen for “his” security was a true feather in our cap for Nsefu Wildlife.
Our conservation programs in the schools have started back up and the antipoaching initiative on the soccer field continues. Thank you to our friends at 5 Star Communications for their continued support of our Chabwera Soccer Team which helps keep young men occupied in sport vs turning their attention to poaching for income.
And lastly, THANK YOU to everyone who showed up for our events this year. We saw the debut of the 1st Annual “Rock the Wild” event...our most successful event yet! Also we were invited to be part of another new annual music event- SoCal Heavy Jam which started off with a bang and helped us raise much-needed funds. AND we are excited to join our friend, KGB-FM Radio Personality Clint August and Motorcycle Monkey for the 1st Annual “Nsefu Motorcycle Monkey Run” being held Saturday January 14th hosted by Michelle Bailey and Full Circle Saloon. The ride begins at Coffee Corner and the after party will happen at Full Circle Saloon with music from “Whiskey State of Mind”. Prizes, opportunity drawings, and silent auctions will be on site with Team Nsefu. Sign up on our website at www.NSEFU.org or show up the day of to sign up!
Wishing you the happiest of holidays dear friends and we thank you from the bottom of our hearts for your support. We are grateful all year round for YOU.
Coe, Victory, and Team Nsefu
