Rita

 Rita

Rita is our seventh star and has recently returned from leave. She is from the Rendille tribe – a semi-pastoralist tribe that keep animals including camels. Rita is only twenty-five and joined Loisaba just over a year ago, having completed her studies on attachment with Sera Conservancy. She is absolutely dedicated to conservation.
“I was born in Wamba but raised in from Maralal in Samburu County where I live with my family. I come from a family of six, my parents, two sisters and one brother.”
“I started working as an Assistant Security Administrator in May last year after completing my internship at Loisaba. After completing my undergraduate studies in Wildlife management and Conservation, I came to Loisaba as an intern in November 2019. I did my internship at the Conservation department for four months before joining the security team. I learnt a lot from the internship, from monitoring of wildlife to preparation of reports; it was a great experience and still is. In the future I see my career scaling up in conservation; I would also like to pursue my Masters in the same field.”

“Now I am based at the headquarters and my work mainly entails maintaining the security JOCC Joint Operations and Communications Centre) system, managing the security database, organizing and coordinating any security meetings, managing the SMART (Spatial Monitoring and Reporting Tool) database and preparation of SMART reports, analyzing ranger’s patrol effort, tracking of vehicle movements and collared wildlife monitoring on Earthranger, creation of Earthranger reports and lastly preparation of security reports.”

"The Earthranger reports contain details of any injured or abandoned animals that we find, any carcasses or snares, stock theft, fence breakages, or locust swarms, and any human/wildlife conflict. We are pleased that there have been no instances of poaching since 2017."

Credit: Ambrose Letoluai - October 2020

“I start my day by checking the security staff register, to ensure that we have the information of the people present and those on their off days. I then ensure that we have a good flow of data from rangers on the ground to SMART The rest of the day then includes other duties like receiving information from the rangers during their daily patrols, preparation of reports and attending to rangers’ needs like issuing of uniforms, supplying them with food ration, which is done after every two weeks.”

“A good day for me is when we as a team manage to accomplish a task together, making sure that our wildlife and the neighboring communities are safe.”
“My worst nightmare would be losing all we have worked for, our wildlife and the most important people who include the rangers; they form an integral part in conservation.”