SAVE AND REHABILITATE

Every day, dozens of young primates are illegally captured, while several adults die defending them.

Our NGO recovers primates seized by the Ivorian authorities as part of large-scale trafficking operations in order to rehabilitate them for life in the wild.

Côte d'Ivoire is the hub of wildlife and endangered species trafficking in West Africa, which is why we are present there with our two sanctuaries to save and give a second life to these survivors..

Our sanctuaries

They are havens of peace in the forest, as close as possible to the primates' natural habitat. Our role is to offer them a safe environment where they can recover from the violence they have endured, rebuild and rehabilitate themselves, and eventually return to life in the wild if their condition allows.

YAPA- — Located in the Yapo-Abbé forest, it is home to around ten small monkeys of several species: **Lesser Spot-Nosed Guenon** (Cercopithecus petaurista), **Sooty mangabey** (Cercocebus atys), **Lowe's Mone** (Cercopithecus lowei), **Campbell's Mone** (Cercopithecus campbelli), **Green vervet** (Chlorocebus sabaeus), **Patas** (Erythrocebus patas).

Photo-Tim-6-1 — Located in the Comoé 1 forest, it is home to around ten chimpanzees aged between one and 30 years.

No, primates don't just eat bananas

For their good health, primates eat a varied and complex diet based on fruit, vegetables, proteins and healthy treats (sugar cane, cocoa pods, wild fruit, etc.). A good diet is essential to their recovery after years of deprivation and mistreatment.

The cost of food for our two sanctuaries alone already represents more than 2,000 euros per month, or more than 1,300,000 CFA francs.

HELP US TO FEED THEM

From the market to the forest

2 May 2023, Jules is seized in Guiglo, a town in the east of Côte d'Ivoire. The illegal keeper of the chimpanzee had made him his pet, which he displayed on social networks. In Facebook and Tiktok videos, he could be seen dressed as a human drinking a soda, eating a cookie or being violently manipulated by humans to take selfies.

Jules has been so undernourished that he is the size of a 2-year-old chimpanzee, half his age. Il porte encore les traces de la chaîne en fer qui l’empêcher d’être libre.

Thanks to the work of Eaglenetwork, the Ministry of Water and Forests and AKATIA, Jules is now with us in our sanctuary and discovering life in the forest. A life he should never have left.

What does 'rehabilitate an animal' mean ?

All the primates we take in are orphans whose mothers and group members have been killed defending them. The youngest are captured to
be sold illegally as pets, while the adults killed are sold for their meat.

When they arrive at our sanctuaries, they have already suffered indescribable violence: in addition to the psychological trauma of violent separation from their families, many have physical injuries such as wounds caused by shotgun pellets or machetes.

What are the stages in the rehabilitation process?

Taking care of the animal

First aid and assessment of the animal's physical and mental condition.

Quarantine

Isolation of the animal from the other orphans and veterinary tests to check that the animal has no disease that could be transmitted to the other boarders.

Rehabilitation (aka the bush school)

The youngest animals are taken out into the bush with their carers to learn how to feed themselves, what the dangers are and how to climb trees. Unfortunately, some animals are too old to go out into the bush for safety reasons¹.

Release

A release protocol is currently being assessed by the Ministry
of Waters and Forests (for small monkeys).

Scientific and technical monitoring

It takes several years and colossal financial and scientific resources to track the individuals released.

Find out more about trafficking and poaching

Find out more about the situation of primates

WE ARE THE FIELD, YOUR ARE THE SUPPORT

Help us to help them

Faced with the increase in rescues of trafficked primates,
we need you more than ever.

Make a donation

Some individuals are too old or too domesticated to go out into the bush. In some cases, they have never been in the forest before, and this would represent a too big risk for them, for the other animals and for humans. We want to build semi-liberty enclosures in the forest to improve their living conditions and allow them to discover, in complete safety, this environment that they should never have left. ↩︎