PRESS RELEASE

Dushanbe Zoo: One Year Later

Students at Holy Cross School in Fort Wayne, IN were at first inspired to act in response to a horrible bear mauling that seriously injured a pen pal on the other side of the world. Though their young friend survived her encounter with a bear living at the Dushanbe Zoo in the capital city of Tajikistan, the students wanted to do something to help ensure such a tragedy could not happen again.

Nearly two years later the results of an international project that grew to involve multiple organizations from the United States and Tajikistan, including some of those original pen-pals from Holy Cross School and School 21 in Dushanbe, are evident. Many hope the results are just the beginning of more good things to come.

A collaboration between the Dushanbe Zoo and Black Pine Animal Park in Albion, IN took shape in early 2007, funded by a $75,000 grant from the American Association of Museums (AAM) through a State Department program known as the Museums and Community Collaborations Abroad (MCCA). U.S. team members from Black Pine, Holy Cross School, Khujand Computer Technologies, and Volunteer Connections of Noble County kicked off the project with a two-week visit to Dushanbe in April 2008, during which they met and worked with Tajik project team members to identify several opportunities for improvement at the city's zoo.

Before the U.S. team could really grasp what kinds of change would be realistic, they first had to become educated on the country's past, and present. Tajikistan, a landlocked country that lies between Afghanistan, Uzbekistan and Kyrgyzstan in Central Asia, suffered a devestating civil war from 1992 to 1997 after gaining independence from the Soviet Union in 1991. The team could see visible signs of how the war had impacted the city and zoo itself, and were told horrific stories about zoo animals that were shot by the Taliban, leaving decaying and empty cages and broken concrete throughout the grounds.

As the team wrapped up their visit abroad they left their new Tajik friends with a very big challenge: to create a successful volunteer program to tackle and complete a number of zoo improvement projects. Led by Victor Ibragimov, coordinator for Youth Opportunities NGO, the Tajik team began recruiting student volunteers from area schools, some of which had been pen-pals with Holy Cross students.

The Tajik team got to work immediately. Their first success was the remodeling of a vacant building at the zoo into a volunteer center, complete with computer and time-tracking system so volunteer work could be recognized and rewarded.

During the next several weeks volunteers would clean up the zoo, begin painting and repairing habitats and safety fences, and obtaining materials to build a new lion habitat. Though those projects alone would be a handful for any well-established volunteer group, the Tajik team also took on the task of developing a whole new visitor area into a childrens' playground and garden. All-new playground equipment was purchased and shipped from the U.S. while local workers also acquired and planted a vareity of fruit-bearing trees and other plants that would help feed animals, as well as very low-paid zoo staff.

In August, 2008, Tajik team members made a recipricol visit to the states to see for themselves how a successfully organized and managed volunteer program can produce amazing results, even with little funding. Zoo volunteers including dignitaries from the Dushanbe Mayor's office, Tajik Technical University, School 21, and Youth Opportunities NGO made visits to several Fort Wayne area volunteer supported organizations including Black Pine Animal Park, Fort Wayne Childrens Zoo, and Indianapolis Zoo to learn and see what they could strive to accomplish at their own city's zoo.

Since returning to Tajikistan the team, joined by a growing number of local volunteers, have made extraordinary progress. Lions cubs born over the winter are now living in a new, larger and naturalistic animal habitat featuring an earth and grass floor instead of concrete. Visitors are learning by example that placing trash in the receptacles provided is good for not only their own health, but the health of the animals living at the zoo. New playground equipment has been installed and new walkways lead visitors through fruit trees, helping to reinforce how use of natural resources can help sustain both animals and people.

The Dushanbe Zoo, with the help and encouragement of their new U.S. friends, is only beginning to realize the positive benefits of volunteerism. As U.S. team members had hoped, volunteering at the Dushanbe Zoo has proven "infectious". Stories of Tajik citizens inspired to join in after seeing groups of young people working to improve the zoo, making it more safe and enjoyable for families and creating better living conditions for animals, have been shared throughout the project.

As the grant-funded portion of the project comes to its end the U.S. team does recognize that some obstacles still exist. Dushanbe is a "new" city in which volunteerism is a foreign concept that must be continually explained and proven to work. Though the grant project may be ending, team members on both sides of the world remain committed to continue their collaboration. Helping keep that effort alive, and recognized, will be the nearly 40 new full-color graphic signs now posted throughout the Dushanbe Zoo on animal habitats to share educational information. One similar sign, with text in Tajik, Russian, and English, stands to recognize the efforts of people from two sides of the world to make lives better in Dushanbe, and for that matter, around the world.

PHOTO: Lion cubs born at the Dushanbe Zoo over the past winter now enjoy the facility's first new habitat, constructed as part of an international collaboration with the U.S. to improve the Tajik capital's zoo.