Cabo Verde

My subject for Cabo Verde is Artur Jorge Tavarez Lopes who has been working in turtle and bird conservation on the island of Sal for 11 years and is a founding member of Projeto Biodiversidade

Geography

Cabo Verde is an archipelago and island country in the central Atlantic Ocean, consisting of ten main volcanic islands lying between 600 and 850 kilometres west of Cap-Vert in Senegal, the westernmost point of continental Africa. These ten islands include the largest island and administrative centre, Santiago and the islands of Sao Vicente and the 30x12km island of Sal where our story with Artur takes us.

Source Wikipedia

Environmental issues

The primary environmental concerns in Cabo Verde are soil erosion; deforestation due to demand for wood used as fuel; biodiversity loss; desertification; water shortages; overfishing and the amplified effects of climate change caused by being an island nation

About Artur

Artur was originally from Sao Vicente, but moved to the 30x12 km island, Sal in 2009.

He started in turtle conservation in 2012 as a local ranger, conducting night patrols on nesting beaches, and was invited to join the coordination team the following year.

Associação Projeto Biodiversidade (or Project Biodiversity) was founded in 2015 by Artur and several colleagues. Project Biodiversity’s mission is to protect Cabo Verde’s natural ecosystems through sustainable practices, aiming to empower the local community both economically and environmentally.

Artur has been involved with the bird and turtle conservation projects. He coordinates a team working to protect nesting loggerhead turtles from poaching and protecting the nests threatened by light pollution by relocating them to one of the hatcheries.

The bird project was initiated in 2017, conducting censuses of nesting seabirds. As part of the fieldwork Artur’s team locate, identify (via ringing) and collect samples of nesting seabirds as well as studying their feeding and migration routes using GPS trackers. Their work has led to the discovery of the largest nesting Red-Billed Tropicbird population in the West of Africa, listed as an endangered species.