IMAGE: REEL GUYANA
SMART TRAVELLER
ME ET THE TR AI L B L A Z E R Annette Arjoon-Martins
RAISED BY HER INDIGENOUS GRANDMOTHER IN GUYANA, SOUTH AMERICA, ANNETTE BUILT A FEMALE DRONE UNIT TO MONITOR MANGROVES
Groundbreaking conservationist, pilot and airline executive Annette Arjoon-Martins has spent much of her career pushing doors open in traditionally male-dominated fields. Through her conservation work at the Imbotero Research Center in Guyana’s remote North West District, she aims to improve the lives of women in the Indigenous Warau community. Tourism to Annette’s wild region — which incudes the Barima-Mora Passage, Guyana’s largest remaining mangrove forest — is in its infancy, but her centre’s introduction of community homestays and environmental protection is helping to raise visitor numbers.
Where does your love of nature come from? My mum had me very young, at 16, and left me with my grandmother, an Indigenous Arawak Black woman living in the Pomeroon riverine community [in northern Guyana]. Growing up there, everything was connected to the environment. I spent my formative years in the hinterlands — that’s what gave me my love for all things environmental at a really young age. It was a very natural progression when choosing my career.
How did you become involved in conservation work? My family have an aviation business and we all learned to fly — it was like learning to ride a bicycle to us. When I started flying, I was blown away by the beauty of our country. I used to fly a US marine biologist to Guyana’s North West District every year, and started wondering what he was doing. One year, I went with him to Shell Beach and within 15 minutes came across my first green sea turtle. It was love at first sight. That got me involved in his conservation programme and I worked for many years to make Shell Beach Guyana’s first National Protected Area.
What makes the Barima-Mora Passage so special? Guyana has 80% of its rainforest still intact, which is a big, big deal in the present global reality. A large part of that figure is our mangroves, and the Barima-Mora Passage is the largest mangrove ecosystem in the country. But what makes it even more special is it’s inhabited by the Warau, one of Guyana’s nine Indigenous peoples. How they manage to survive in this challenging landscape is remarkable. There are crazy wildlife opportunities. The Barima-
Mora Passage is a biodiversity hotspot, home to several threatened species. You can see monkeys such as howlers and capuchins, and there’s fantastic bird life — scarlet ibis by the hundreds, plus the black chested tyrant and the belted kingfisher.
How the Warau people manage to survive in this challenging landscape is remarkable
Can tourism help support the Warau community? Travellers get a very immersive experience. The research centre accommodates people overnight, but part of our support for women comes through homestays. Tourists stay with a family and experience the Warau way of life and the families earn income directly. We also bring women with their basketry and gorgeous handwoven Warau hammocks to the centre so visitors can buy them.
What’s the story behind the female drone team? There are 228 Indigenous communities in Guyana and most of the livelihood opportunities for the women within them is producing Indigenous crafts or condiments. I didn’t want our women competing against 200 other women. Teaching them to fly drones to monitor the mangroves — in order to spot degradation, illegal cutting and forest fires — provides an ecosystem service that can be monetised. If we didn’t have this monitoring effort, we would have likely lost more mangrove. There would be less wildlife around the research centre and in the community for both locals and tourists to see. INTERVIEW: JO DAVEY Guyana-based tour company Wilderness Explorers works with Annette to create tailored tours to the Barima-Mora Passage.
wilderness-explorers.com
imbotero.org
NOVEMBER 2024 45
Page 1 |
Page 2 |
Page 3 |
Page 4 |
Page 5 |
Page 6 |
Page 7 |
Page 8 |
Page 9 |
Page 10 |
Page 11 |
Page 12 |
Page 13 |
Page 14 |
Page 15 |
Page 16 |
Page 17 |
Page 18 |
Page 19 |
Page 20 |
Page 21 |
Page 22 |
Page 23 |
Page 24 |
Page 25 |
Page 26 |
Page 27 |
Page 28 |
Page 29 |
Page 30 |
Page 31 |
Page 32 |
Page 33 |
Page 34 |
Page 35 |
Page 36 |
Page 37 |
Page 38 |
Page 39 |
Page 40 |
Page 41 |
Page 42 |
Page 43 |
Page 44 |
Page 45 |
Page 46 |
Page 47 |
Page 48 |
Page 49 |
Page 50 |
Page 51 |
Page 52 |
Page 53 |
Page 54 |
Page 55 |
Page 56 |
Page 57 |
Page 58 |
Page 59 |
Page 60 |
Page 61 |
Page 62 |
Page 63 |
Page 64 |
Page 65 |
Page 66 |
Page 67 |
Page 68 |
Page 69 |
Page 70 |
Page 71 |
Page 72 |
Page 73 |
Page 74 |
Page 75 |
Page 76 |
Page 77 |
Page 78 |
Page 79 |
Page 80 |
Page 81 |
Page 82 |
Page 83 |
Page 84 |
Page 85 |
Page 86 |
Page 87 |
Page 88 |
Page 89 |
Page 90 |
Page 91 |
Page 92 |
Page 93 |
Page 94 |
Page 95 |
Page 96 |
Page 97 |
Page 98 |
Page 99 |
Page 100 |
Page 101 |
Page 102 |
Page 103 |
Page 104 |
Page 105 |
Page 106 |
Page 107 |
Page 108 |
Page 109 |
Page 110 |
Page 111 |
Page 112 |
Page 113 |
Page 114 |
Page 115 |
Page 116 |
Page 117 |
Page 118 |
Page 119 |
Page 120 |
Page 121 |
Page 122 |
Page 123 |
Page 124 |
Page 125 |
Page 126 |
Page 127 |
Page 128 |
Page 129 |
Page 130 |
Page 131 |
Page 132 |
Page 133 |
Page 134 |
Page 135 |
Page 136 |
Page 137 |
Page 138 |
Page 139 |
Page 140 |
Page 141 |
Page 142 |
Page 143 |
Page 144 |
Page 145 |
Page 146 |
Page 147 |
Page 148 |
Page 149 |
Page 150 |
Page 151 |
Page 152 |
Page 153 |
Page 154 |
Page 155 |
Page 156 |
Page 157 |
Page 158 |
Page 159 |
Page 160 |
Page 161 |
Page 162 |
Page 163 |
Page 164 |
Page 165 |
Page 166 |
Page 167 |
Page 168 |
Page 169 |
Page 170 |
Page 171 |
Page 172 |
Page 173 |
Page 174 |
Page 175 |
Page 176 |
Page 177 |
Page 178 |
Page 179 |
Page 180 |
Page 181 |
Page 182 |
Page 183 |
Page 184 |
Page 185 |
Page 186 |
Page 187 |
Page 188 |
Page 189 |
Page 190 |
Page 191 |
Page 192 |
Page 193 |
Page 194 |
Page 195 |
Page 196
