Conservation Clubs
of Zambia (CCCZ)
Dear Club
Leader
We thank you for your effort and time to register/renew your
club with us. We wish you all the best in all your endeavors
this year. As you affiliate your club with us. we request that
you cross whether your club is new or old. or whether it is a
Chongololo or Conservation club.
From grade 1-7, you register your club as a Chongololo Club.
From grade 8-12 your club should be registered as a Conservation
Club. In cases where your school is a basic school, two clubs
should be registered; A Chongololo Club from grade 1-7 and a
Conservation Club from grade 8-9. Where clubs exists in
churches, communities or any other conservation groups, clubs
with members 12 years and below are Chongololo Clubs while clubs
with members 13 years and above are Conservation Clubs. The
recommended maximum number of members per club is 30 and if the
number exceeds 30 it is recommended that you split the group for
maximum participate of each member.
Please
read the Chongololo and Conservations Club´s
Terms & Conditions
before submiting the
memberhip form.
Terms & Conditions
for CCCZ
A registered member of the Chongololo and Conservation Club
of Zambia agrees to the following terms and conditions:
1: Use of the name (Chongololo/Conservation ) and logos.
You will be allowed to use these when you are engaged in
authorised club activities (authorisation to be obtained from
club leader, Head teacher or Wildlife and Environmental
Conservation Society of Zambia representative in your area).
2: Authorised activities do not include:
political activities or propaganda to influence legislation.
Your club may engage in fundraising , conservation
education,
environmental
awareness promotion, encouragement of new clubs and conservation
related projects consistent with the objectives of the Wildlife
and
Environmental Conservation Society of Zambia (WECSZ) as detailed
below;
-
To promote efforts to conserve the natural diversity of
Zambia’s flora and fauna
in balance with the needs of mankind.
-
To develop Environmental education projects and activities for
youth of Zambia
and to support other organisations with the same aim.
-
To provide a channel for the collection and distribution of
conservation-related
information.
3: Registration fees:
This is determined by WECSZ from time to time and entitles your
club to the following :
-
Registration Certificate
-
Chongololo/Chipembele magazines (as appropriate and when
available)
-
Club Newsletters (as appropriate and when available)
-
Enviromental education materials from WECSZ and other national
and international sources when available.
-
Major conservation book publications at a nominal cost.
-
Opportunity
to participate in national and international competitions.
-
Opportunity
to participate in workshops / seminars when conducted in your
area and when funds allow, in areas outside your vicinity.
-
Membership with Wildlife and Environmental Conservation Society
of Zambia (no
voting rights).
A full voting member of the WECSZ pays a higher fee (determined
by WECSZ from time to time) and receives a bi-monthly
newsletter, Membership card, preferential rates at society camps
and lodges. Free/discounted access to society events. Read more
about Society membership by
clicking here.
Thank you.
The Story of Chongololo - Part
II
01/11/2006
By Ian Tanner
THE SCOPE OF THE PROGRAMME
Timing and distribution
Chongololo magazine is scheduled to appear six times annually,
that is twice in each school term. Every effort is made to
ensure that this first issue in each term arrives in the schools
shortly after the beginning of the term, the second arriving at,
or before, half term. In this way projects and work suggested
may be carried on on a continuing basis throughout the year.
Until early 1977 the magazine was distributed free of charge to
each of the 2,680 schools shown on the Ministry of Education
records. Each school received variously between three and five
copies of each issue of the magazine, this serving to introduce
the Chongololo Programme to the school. It was as a direct
result of this that many schools formed clubs and registered
them with the Society. The escalating costs of running the
programme, coupled with increasing doubts as to the fate of the
magazine in many schools, resulted in the decision to end the
unsolicited mailings to all schools. At the outset of the
programme, clubs registered with the Society became eligible to
receive 40 copies of each issue and several Teacher’s Guides.
Such was the registration of clubs that by the end of 1975 the
Society could only afford to send 30 magazines and one Teacher’s
Guide to registered clubs. Today each club receives 25 issues
and one Teacher’s Guide.
Ancillary services
In the early days the Society produced a ‘How to Start’ booklet
on how to start and run a Chongololo Club, this being re-printed
in 1975 to meet the continuing demand for help in setting up a
viable club. The booklet covers administrative matters, ideas
for projects, and includes a source list of addresses and
publications which may be of use to a newly-formed club. The
current view is that this information is now out-dated and it is
hoped that a completely new edition will be forthcoming.
A wall chart, linking four issues of Chongololo and expanding
the information carried in those issues, was produced. Shortage
of funds and personnel have limited further productions, though
there are still hopes of a two-part wall chart on the birds of
Zambia, this in conjuction with the Zambian Ornithological
Society.
The production of educational card games with a wildlife theme,
the first of which, “POACHER”, is proving very popular, will
take the conservation message to a much wider young audience.
Services and concessions for registered Chongololo Clubs
- Chongololo Club members who have a good attendance and
endeavour records in their clubs qualify for Chongololo badges;
- Clubs may obtain free entry to the botanical and zoological
gardens of Munda Wanga on application to the Society;
- Ancillary productions of the Society and the Chongololo
Programme are often available to registered clubs at a reduced
rate;
- The Society negotiated with a national book distributor a
discount rate for books purchased by registered clubs:
regrettably there are all too few suitable books available today
to satisfy the ever-growing demand of Chongololo members;
A newsletter goes out with each issue of Chongololo, announcing
competitions for Clubs, conservation measures of a national
nature, and other events of interest to Clubs.
OTHER ASPECTS OF THE PROGRAMME
Outside contacts
The Society has maintained for four years close links with
Natural Resources Officers (working under the Government
Conservator of Natural Resources) and provides them with
Chongololo magazines which are used in their work with both
younger children and adults in the rural natural resources
education programme run by the department. In recent months this
service to those connected with broader aspects of conservation,
or to those in contact with children through their employment,
has been extended. Chongololo is now mailed to provincial and
district national resources officers; provincial and district
libraries; chief education officers; district education
officers; inspectors of schools, both secondary and primary
schools; prisons with library centres; research stations with
library centres; community develop-ment centres with libraries
and teacher training colleges, which latter receive a larger
number of Teacher’s Guides to assist with developing curriculum
programmes based on Chongololo for the trainee teachers.
School Camps
The Society maintains an interest in the two schools camps,
Nyamaluma and Treetops, which were originally established with
funds provided by the Society, and raised from the Beit Trust.
Although these camps have been run and maintained for many years
by government the Society pays the salary of the warden of
Treetops Camp. John Hazam, originally at Nyamaluma, in Luangwa
Valley, moved to Treetops on the edge of the Busanga plain in
Kafue National Park to undertake the training of Zambian staff
in the running of the camp. The courses run at the camps are
essentially based on the visitor’s practical experiences and
observations in the field, although an increasing amount of
source and follow-up material is based on the Chongololo
magazine and its Teacher’s Guide.
Society Branch Education Activities
Throughout the history of the programme branches of the Society
have inolved themselves in Chongololo extension work to a
greater or lesser extent. The holding of local art competitions,
the visiting of schools and the showing of films, the taking of
parties of children to centres of zoological or biological
interest, and in some instances the running of a full-scale
“conservation week” as a climax to the year’s activities are but
some of the manifestations of Society branch involvement. In
this way thousands of children annually come into direct contact
with conservation-minded individuals who are in a position to
“make real” some of the conservation message.
This practical involvement has extended to the provision of a
20-seater bus, in the case of Kabwe Branch, which takes pupils
to Treetops Camp during the national parks open season, and to
centres of interest for the remainder of the year. The bus, the
“Chongololo Express” was provided by the small but active Kabwe
Rotary Club, and to date close on a thousand children must have
taken the trip to practical, in-the-field wildlife through this
far-sighted generosity.
Employment of an Education Field Officer
The Ndola/Luanshya branch of the Society employed a full-time
education field officer for close on three years and, as well as
liaising with the many Chongololo Clubs in the immediate area,
he was engaged in the production of teaching and visual-aid
materials. In addition he maintained contact with the adult
population through conservation talks spon-sored and run by the
branch.
FUNDING
The expanded Chongololo Programme, embarked on in early 1974,
was scheduled to run for two years initially. Funds were
solicited and received from the Frankfurt Zoological Society,
and the mining companies in Zambia: Anglo American Corporation
(Central Africa) Limited, Nchanga Consolidated Copper Mines and
Roan Consolidated Mines. Of the original K35,000 raised for the
programme, sufficient remained at the completion of the initial
two years to enable production of Chongololo magazine to June of
1976. By then the Society had been authorised by the Zambian
government to make approaches to a number of international
bodies in an endeavour to seek further funds to ensure the
future of the Chongololo Programme. The present world economic
situation made this hunt for funds a far from fruitful one.
The World Wildlife Fund is funding the Chongololo Programme to
the extent of guaranteeing assistance in the sum of US$10,000
annually, this for a three-year period ending in mid-1979. This
represents some K7,800 annually towards the programme, dependent
on exchange rates. The fate of the US dollar on international
money markets recently points to a reduced income in 1979. Jimmy
Carter’s anti-inflationary moves are being closely watched!
Additional funding has been forthcoming from Bata Shoe Company
of Zambia, this in the form of a K800.00 grant per issue
completed, representing K4,800.00 annually. Without the support
of these two organisations Chongololo may well have become
“extinct” in 1977.
A recently revised estimate of the Society’s financial needs in
order to maintain Chongololo at its present strength and
efficiency suggests an outlay in excess of K23,200 per annum.
Set against this total, incoming grants as above, together with
small grants from local organisations, still leave the Society
with a shortfall of K10,000 per annum. This shortfall is made up
from the Society’s diminishing general fund which is sustained
principally by earnings from publications.
RECENT DEVELOPMENTS
In January 1977 Lorraine Legg put out her first radio programme
on Chongololo under the aegis of the Bata Shoe Company.
Originally a ten-minute weekly spot in the Bata radio half-hour,
Lorraine has gradually taken over more and more of the programme
and now has the lion’s share. Every Sunday from 1245 to 1315
hours the listening audience around Zambia tunes in to
informative, frequently amusing and always well-presented
wildlife material. Lorraine has kept up the hectic pace without
break, and even contrived to leave sufficient pre-recorded tapes
for the programme to continue uninterrupted during a near
three-month leave earlier this year. A considerable amount of
correspondence results from the radio show, perhaps the most
significant advance in the Chongololo programme since the
magazine went nationwide in 1974. It is not out of place to
mention here that the Bata Shoe Company. in many countries, is
playing an increasingly active part in the education of young
people to an awareness and appreciation of their environment.
Bata’s education programmes are attractive and comprehensive and
will have a considerable impact on the rising generation around
the world.
In January 1978, through the initiative of the Copperbelt
Central branch of the Society, a 13 week television series
began. The “Chongololo Show”, screened at 1800 hours every
Wednesday, rapidly became a great favourite in households along
the line-of-rail. Such was the success of the original series
that ZTV requested a second series, which will run to the year
end. Few realise how much organisation goes into a full
half-hour programme; and the effort demanded becomes
proportionately greater as studios offer fewer facilities.
Despite starting each show “from scratch”, with only cameras,
lights, technicians and studio space to hand, imaginative visual
aids and varied approaches have resulted in a good standard of
presentation and Copperbelt Central branch deserves great credit
for its organisation of the series. I remember the care with
which the late Robbie Robinson and Betty Duberly helped organise
me into one of the pro-grammes, Robby even taking me, plus
participating children, to the studio and making sure that all
was in order there. Throughout the show he sat at the back of
the studio, chuckling at my embarrassing moments and giving
fairly discreet thumbs-ups at intervals. Afterwards we repaired
to Betty’s for refreshment. It was at Betty’s “cafe” two weeks
later that I bumped into Lorraine Legg and her family. receiving
their pre-show meal,and using the lounge floor as a last-minute
preparation room and rehearsal studio. To all who help with the
programmes, the Society and the thousands of Chongololo Show
“addicts” owe a great deal.
The second series, with Joan Benson, Bryan Coates, Chris and
Adele Kirby, Catriona Gibb and a strong supporting team,
relinquishes the programme to Lusaka branch which will put out
the Chongololo Show from Lusaka from January 1979. It will be as
time-consuming to Lusaka members involved, as demanding and
hopefully as rewarding and effective. Copperbelt Central
production team, after a well-earned rest, will doubtless be
scripting a further series before long!
THE FUTURE
Earlier I recorded that the number of magazines sent to
registered Chongololo Clubs has now been dropped to 25 per
issue, and that clubs were asked to re-register earlier this
year in an effort to tighten up on wastage of material in
schools. These two measures had the effect of reducing the
Chongololo print run substantially, though enabling a fair
coverage of Chongololo to those schools using the programme
effectively. The reduction in numbers has resulted in little or
no financial saving, however, as printing costs steadily rise,
and general cost of living increases affect the programme
eventually.
Many of the children exposed to its message have graduated to
secondary schools. A number of secondary schools have asked for,
and receive, Chongololo for use in the lower forms, where its
message, its content and its projects are appropriate. Some of
our earliest Chongololo recipients are now in their fourth year
in secondary schools. Other senior pupils have met Chongololo
through younger brothers and sisters who are members. More have
known Chongololo through the radio programme and the Chongololo
TV Show.
This adds up to a sizeable proportion of the secondary school
population being aware of wildlife, and the need for
conservation measures.
Wildlife Clubs in secondary schools used to exist; some still
do. They used to be serviced by the Education/Information Unit
of the National Parks and Wildlife Service. This unit is based
in Chipata, runs Nyamaluma School Camp in Luangwa Valley and saw
its heyday during the era of the UN/FAO project in Luangwa. With
the stimulus of Mark Boulton, Lars Ekholm, John Hazam and others
the unit ran a viable Wildlife Clubs network in the early
seventies. During the difficult times of the last three years
the Wildlife Clubs have foundered. This is where the expansion
is so urgently needed. This last observation is not lightly
made, nor is it based just on the historical logic above. During
the past year many more school children of form five standard
are writing to us asking for assistance with wildlife clubs.
Many more requests for employment in the National Parks and
Wildlife Service are from form five certificate holders, rather
than, as previously, from the unemployed sector generally.
Many of these students turned out last year to become actively
involved in the Lusaka Branch Zoo at the Agricultural Show; many
of them volunteered to join street collectors on Anti-poaching
Flag Day in Lusaka. Many of them now seek to be involved.
From the Lusaka branch newsletter of November: “The weekend trip
21st to 23rd October, to Itezhi-Tezhi, was not well attended by
members. However 28 boys from David Kaunda and Libala secondary
schools made it a worth-while project. They camped out under the
stars in amusing straight lines and were certainly. interested
in the tree walk.....”
The 28 boys approached the branch as a result of a note in a
branch newsletter announcing the trip. They brought their own
food and provided their own transport. The interest and the
motivation are there. What is needed is a bridge between the
Chongololo age group and full Society membership status.
Wildlife Clubs should be that bridge and should lead on to
student membership.
Because Chongololo has been successful we face this new problem,
the problem of the follow-up. And that problem is with us today.
The executive committee in late 1977 suggested a pilot scheme to
be run in one or two selected secondary schools which might then
lead to the formation of “Conservation Clubs” in secondary
schools, initially a low key project, later, perhaps, to develop
more fully. Because of over-commitment of members and full-time
education staff this pilot scheme did not get off the ground. In
late 1978 the need is far greater, and the implications for the
future of this society far greater.
Education was our major platform in 1973/4. It still is now, and
should continue to be so, for this is the area where we, as a
voluntary conservation organisation, can most usefully serve
Zambia’s wildlife in the long term.
