Wildlife TRAFFIC or wild life and lots of traffic??

The destination for my latest venture is India, primarily Delhi, the city where anything and everything can happen in an instant. I have once again tied up the laces on my travelling boots and set off for unknown territory leaving behind the comforts of English living, clean water and safe food. The motivation behind this latest expedition is the opportunity to volunteer for three month with WWF in their wildlife TRAFFIC department. I did not know much about the trafficking of animals before I left but WWF seems to me an idol in the conservation world and so I was happy to snatch up any opportunity to get on board. WWF (World Wide Fund for Nature) works all over the world on a wide range of projects trying to protect the natural world and to support people to change the way they live in order to ease pressure on the remaining natural resources, hopefully I can help in some way!

I originally applied for the WWF youth volunteer programme in my final year of university when I was trying to find opportunities to get experience abroad. I heard back from them but unfortunately the time that they had available was during my final exam period so I decided I should probably get my degree first and asked them to keep me on record. Time passed and I had forgotten about the project until one hot day when I was out in Egypt sat in an internet cafe with donkey carts and horns blaring out in the street, I received an email saying there was another opportunity and asking if I was interested. Of course I was very interested, although to begin with I was a little uncertain as the timing meant that I would only have one month between finishing Global Xchange and leaving for India, hardly enough time to visit friends and family never mind raise the funds necessary. Eventually it was decided that life is for living and I would kick myself if I didn’t go for it so I asked to be considered, completed a phone interview (back in the UK), refreshed my application form and answered a bunch of (rather hard) questions about wildlife trade in India etc.....and they said yes!

During my time working with TRAFFIC I am going to be completing a research project. It is basically in the form of a dissertation so includes lots of background research, information gathering, field projects, questionnaires/surveys, current data collection and then analysis and reporting - rather more hard work than I realised when I signed up! My project is entitled ‘Regional Cooperation for Biodiversity Conservation: lessons learnt from around the world and the way forward for salutation’ which sounds very big and important and I’m still trying to understand the concept! Basically I am researching lots of examples of regional cooperation from around the world and trying to determine their progress and examples of cooperation, I’m then looking at the current situation in India which is, as we speak, initiating plans for it’s own wildlife network with seven neighbouring countries and then making suggestions for the best way to progress....sounds easy right?? There is another volunteer here at the same time as me called Melissa, also from England, and her project is entitled ‘The role the tiger plays in local economics’.

Melissa and I are living together in a very nice apartment provided for us by WWF in the south of New Delhi. It is a short commute via auto rickshaw to the office each day and we have local markets within walking distance to cook for ourselves and a nearby leisure centre with gym and outdoor pool which we have both signed up to. We have now settled in although it was quite hard to begin with as our supervisor and other people in the office thought we knew what we were doing and just left us to it with no training or orientation, but actually we didn’t have a clue so felt a little bit stranded. Both of us had expected more active community based work but are now trying to focus on the research idea with the hope that if it’s done well it can have a greater impact towards helping progress. In addition to my office outings I have been making the most of my free time to try to see the city and get a taste of the country in which I am now living. A number of short stories detailing these trips are hopefully to follow shortly and continue as I venture further afield.

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