Eswatini
The subject for my portrait for Eswatini is Mduduzi Ngwenya, known as Mdu, who is an expert tracker as well as a conservationist and environmental educator.
About Eswatini
Eswatini,also known by its former official name, Swaziland, is a landlocked country in Southern Africa. It is bordered by South Africa on all sides except the northeast, where it shares a border with Mozambique. At no more than 200 km north to south and 130 km east to west, Eswatini is one of the smallest countries in Africa; despite this, its climate and topography are diverse, ranging from a cool and mountainous highveld to a hot and dry lowveld.
The main environmental issues facing Eswatini are climate change impacts, including increased droughts, floods, and heat, which threaten agriculture and water security, along with poor waste and chemical management, with urban and agricultural waste and industrial pollution contaminating water sources. These issues are exacerbated by a heavy reliance on agriculture and challenges implementing and enforcing effective environmental policies
About Mdu
Mdu works for All Out Africa as their Assistant Savannah Conservation Coordinator and he has been out at the Mbuluzi Game Reserve where the research centre is based, since almost as long as the company has been running. He is described as their tracker extraordinaire and has conducted vast amounts trapping research on small rodents, birds and bats, collating invaluable data for the centre
Working as an educator, Mdu will take school groups out to do field work and teach them about the ecosystem, animal tracks and trees including the importance of each tree and the part it plays in their culture
At the research centre Mdu has monitored vultures looking at population size and recording the different species. For the last 15 years he has been involved in projects looking at Maribou storks' movements once they fledge and their migration patterns
Mdu also supports university students helping them collect their data. Much of this work is done with the University of Eswatini along with visiting international students from countries such as the United States, United Kingdom, South Africa and The Netherlands, including Masters and PHD students.
Watch the portrait's story below
This video shows the painting process, and tells some of Mdu's story.
