Lecture Synopsis John
Hare
John Hare has managed to obtain permission to enter an area which
has been prohibited to foreigners for over fifty years. There are
over 60 high quality slides. John Hare, a Fellow of the Royal
Geographical Society and the Explorers’ Club of America has lectured
to the Royal Geographical Society, the Royal Society for Asian
Affairs, the United Nations, the Great Britain-China Centre, the
British Camelid Society and the Scientific Exploration Society. He
has lectured in the USA to the National Geographic Society, The
Smithsonian, the American Museum of Natural History, the Explorers’
Club, the China Institute, to Societies in Hong Kong, China and
Kenya and to numerous zoos, schools and colleges. John Hare has been
awarded the Ness award by the RGS and the Lawrence of Arabia Award
by the Royal Society of Asian Affairs
Lecture 1: Expeditions into the former Chinese nuclear test area
of Lop Nur in search of the critically endangered wild Bactrian
camel
John Hare has made four expeditions to the Mongolian and Chinese
Gobi deserts. The first in 1993 with Russian scientists and the
second, third and fourth with Chinese scientists in 1995,1996 and
1997. He is the first recorded foreigner to have crossed the Gashun
Gobi from north to south. These expeditions were primarily concerned
with tracking down the mysterious, wild Bactrian camel Camelus
bactrianus ferus which lives in the heartland of the desert and is
the ancestor of all domestic Bactrian stock. There are under a
thousand left in the world and the wild Bactrian camel is more
endangered than the giant Panda. The vast and still partially
unknown region of the Gashun Gobi encompasses the Chinese nuclear
testing area and in 1995 he was fortunate to obtain permission to
travel there. He was also fortunate to take unique photographs of a
wild camel with a seven-hour-old calf. It had given birth deep in
the remote Kum Tagh sand dunes.
Lecture 2: The 1999 wild Bactrian camel survey in the Gobi desert
of China illustrated with 60 colour slides - 50 minutes
This survey traversed some hitherto unexplored sand dunes near the
northern Tibet escarpment that led John Hare into two undiscovered
valleys holding pockets of wildlife that had no fear of man. In
addition to seeing 169 wild Bactrian camels the expedition also saw
the Tibetan ass, Argali wild sheep, wolves and bears. The expedition
had many adventures, including an encounter with wolves and a
‘black’ sand storm.
The survey resulted in the establishment of a new Chinese national
nature reserve to protect the critically endangered wild Bactrian
camel.
Lecture 3: Across the Sahara from Lake Chad to Tripoli by camel
illustrated with 60 colour slides - 50 minutes
From October 26th 2001 until February 1st 2002 John Hare made a
crossing of the Sahara by camel following one of the most ancient
highways in the world. The camel route from Lake Chad to Tripoli.
The journey he undertook with camels from Kukawa in Borno State,
northern Nigeria to Tripoli in Libya lasted from October 26th 2001
to February 2nd 2002 (three and a half months) and covered 1462
miles. He had no assistance from any mechanical conveyance
whatsoever and the only concession to modern technology was a
satellite telephone. The route followed one of the four great camel
roads that crossed the Sahara prior to the introduction of the
internal combustion engine. It encompassed both Niger and Libya in
their entirety from north to south. The last foreigner to make the
complete crossing was by Hanns Vischer in 1906 and it has not been
traversed in its entirety since that date.
WILD
CAMEL PROTECTION FOUNDATION
The
Wild Camel Protection Foundation (WCPF), a UK based charitable foundation
with Jane Goodall as its patron, was established in 1997 specifically
to protect the critically endangered wild Bactrian camel in its pristine
desert environment in the Gobi deserts of China and Mongolia.
Its outstanding achievement is to have raised finances and persuaded
the Chinese government to establish a 150,000 square kilometre national
Nature Reserve to protect the wild Bactrian camel in Lop Nur, the
former nuclear test area of China. The wild Bactrian camel survives
in this harsh environment on a salt-water slush that no other mammal
can tolerate. In addition, the wild Bactrian camel has survived over
40 atmospheric nuclear tests and current scientific research is showing
that it has a base genetic make-up which varies from the domestic
Bactrian camel by as much as 3 per cent.
Other
achievements of the WCPF have been the organizing of a meeting between
the Vice-Ministers of the Environment of the Governments of China
and Mongolia, which resulted in the signing of an agreement by both
countries to cooperate in wild Bactrian camel protection. In addition,
the WCPF is currently involved in establishing a captive wild Bactrian
camel breeding programme near the Great Gobi Reserve A, a protected
area in Mongolia. This programme had the full backing of the Mongolian
government. It is vital as there are only 15 wild Bactrian camels
in captivity out of as total of under 800 in the wild.
The
WCPF has raised over $250,000 from international trusts and companies
and is constantly striving to raise additional finance. In 1999, the
National Geographic Society and the Royal Geographical Society financed
a WCPF expedition into the Chinese Gobi to survey the wild Bactrian
camel population. This resulted in a sighting of 169 wild camels,
an enormous achievement.
An
environmental, awareness-raising educational programme linked to the
new Reserve and Jane Goodall's Roots and Shoots scheme in China and
Mongolia has produced awareness-raising booklets both in local languages
for schools and adults in both countries and this programme is constantly
expanding.
Further
details of the work of the WCPF, contact:
