Papua Bird Club (PBC) was founded in 1985 by Kris Tindige*, whose life
was dedicated to the promotion of conservation in Papua (formerly
Irian Jaya) and the support of Indigenous villages through ecotourism
and education. Originally a Yayasan - a non profit-making organization
- PBC provided natural history and cultural tours, the profits of
which were disbursed to education and community development programmes.
Tragically, Kris died from cancer at the age of only 41, after two
years of medical treatment that was funded by more than a 100 people
from 15 countries around the world, including Friends of Kris Tindige
in Australia (FOKTA). Needless to say, Papua lost one of its few
champions - a passionate and selfless advocate of conservation and
sustainable livelihoods for Indigenous people.
Happily, however, the community work of PBC continues, due to the
tireless efforts of his partner, Shita Prativi, as well as supporters,
who convinced Shita to establish a commercial tour company in order to
better promote their cause (and make her own life a little easier).
Unhappily, though, the economic downturn has resulted in the
cancellation of many tours by would-be clients.
For this reason, Dr Richard Noske is organising the first group trip
from Australia, scheduled for October this year. The 15-day trip will
be led by Shita’s business partner (Untu), who has been leading bird
tours for many years in Kris’s original home, North Sulawesi. [Richard
can heartily recommend Untu from his own experience]. It promises at
least six birds-of-paradise (using hides), some endemic to Papua, the
amazing Vogelkop Bowerbird, featured on many films produced by David
Attenborough (who acknowledges Kris’s assistance) and much, much more.
Throughout the trip, they will be using local guides and villagers,
who benefit directly from the tours. One village is now completely
self-sufficient due to earnings from ecotours (the subject of one of
Richard’s PhD students).
If you are interested in the trip, please contact Richard directly at:
* An obituary for Kris Tindige appears on the temporary Birding-Aus
website at http://birdingaus.wordpress.com/conservation/ (This will
be the format of the new Birding-Aus website when it moves to a new
web host in a couple of weeks - more about this soon)
Russell Woodford
Birding-Aus List Owner
Geelong Victoria Australia
http://www.birding-aus.org
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