This article first appeared on page 19 of Birdwatching Magazine Autumn 2024
A while ago I was approached by a remarkable woman asking for help for a project she set up. Lucy Mathen, an Indian-born British BBC journalist, often reported third world tragedy to the world. After working on a documentary about women in Afghanistan she resolved that the next time she was in a place where people were suffering, she would not report on it, but do something to help. True to her vow she retrained as a physician in London and ended up specialising in ophthalmology, part of which was a course in India where she saw how cataracts were leading to blindness where there were no clinics ordinary people could afford. Shortly after finishing her training she set up a charity ‘Second Sight’, to treat cataracts in India’s poorest state, Bihar.
She loves wildlife and is something of a birder both when she is home in East Anglia and when working out in Bihar. She got in touch with me to help promote an eco-hotel which has been created above the hospital established by Second Sight where thousands of cataract operations have been performed. The Hotel Ananda’s room charge is very low by western standards, but is exactly the same as the cost of one cataract operation… so every day someone stays there an operation is paid for!
Obviously, I did what I could and told a number of bird tour companies I’ve worked with, all about the scheme. Bihar is a rural state with many birding opportunities and great birds like the prehistoric looking Great Adjutant. One company has already donated and several are seeing how they can make the hotel one of their stopping places when running bird tours in that part of India.
Apart from wanting to do my bit, it got me thinking about how we birders can have a positive impact on the places we visit, home and away. Many bird companies are pretty good at giving back to the places they take us birders to. Some devote a percentage of their profits to good causes and favour birding-based ones as well as trying to make sure that most of our spend helps local economies. Green tourism sometimes replaces damaging activities like trapping birds for sale and many a poacher has turned gamekeeper when they can make a living from helping to save habitat and species.
But what do you and I do? Is it enough to pay your dues to a bird club and conservation organisation, or chip in at an organised twitch. The short answer is no! I’ve known of twitches where the footfall was in the thousands and the funds raised in the hundreds – birders having a great day out for a handful of coppers. However, landowners tend to suggest donations to their favourite good cause, like cancer research or the local church spire repair. Most of what we otherwise spend is short-term and self-interested.
Overseas, its sort of obvious we should help. Going to third world countries it’s a no-brainer that we should take pens and books, T-shirts and so on for local kids. Your old bins could well be what sets a local youth on the road to becoming a tour guide. But, here at home, birders’ meanness is almost legend. One of the reserves I regularly visit, started charging for the carpark, to help pay for conservation of the site. What happened? They gave up and made it free again because 95% of birders parked in the road rather than pay! If we want there to be places for our kids to bird, we need to start paying it forward!
Second Sight Charity https://www.secondsight.org.uk
