Using text messages to keep tabs on lions

According to the latest figures from the GSMA (Association of Mobile Operators and Related Companies) Africa is now the second largest mobile market in the world (behind Asia) and growing by 20% a year.  At the same time, use of the internet throughout Africa is still relatively low due of a lack of infrastructure.  As a consequence of having limited internet access many countries in Africa have turned to SMS to help provide and collect import information, which we in the West would simple collect via the internet.  This means that there have been some very novel mobile solution created in Africa which make the most of the ubiquity of mobile phone and the popularity and low cost of sending and receiving text messages.

As case in point is a new mobile solution which has been set up to monitor lions in Kenya by SMS with the aim of reducing conflict between local Maasi herders and the lions.   It seems that in recent years there has been a sharp decline in the number of lions that live outside Kenya’s national parks, dropping from an estimate of 100,000 down to 30,000.  And the main cause for the reduction has been due to conflict between the Maasi and the lion population.  However, steps have been taken to get the Maasi tribes more involved with lion conservation thanks to Living with Lions and Lion Guardians (two non-profit organisation dedicated safeguarding the lion population in Africa).  

As part of their initiative to help protect lions in Kenya collars have been put on lions which send its coordinates by SMS to researchers and the Maasi Lion Guardians.  They can then warn local herdsmen about the potential threat so they can take steps to protect their livestock.  Now, usually monitoring animals in the wild requires a satellite link and is very expensive. Yet by gathering this information through mobile technology, the researchers can get the same vital information at a fraction of the cost of a satellite.

The mobile solution has been developed by the New York based company Ground Lab in collaboration with Living with Lions and Lion Guardians.  The collars incorporate a GPS unit and cheap cellular modem that can make calls, send text messages, or use a mobile-data network.  It provides an inexpensive way to link low cost mobile devices to the internet via a cell network.  More importantly it shows an innovative way to gain the benefits of wireless data in regions that do not have 3G mobile networks or even a cable-based telecommunication infrastructure.

Given the low cost of this SMS-based system, I can imagine it being used to help keep tabs on other wildlife and even livestock possibly…there are so many other places around the world where man struggles to co-exist with large predators.