As we continue exploring human-wildlife conflict challenges across East Africa and the accompanying stellar conservation technologies and tools that have been developed and adopted to promote coexistence and solve this issue among communities (you can read more about this in our article here), we sit down with Gabriela Fleury, human-predator conflict expert to deepen our understanding on the importance of holistic, ethical and community-led approaches to not only solving human-wildlife conflict challenges across the Global South but also in developing durable and effective tech solutions. 

Gabriela Fleury

Gabriela “Gabi” Fleury studies ways for humans and wild carnivores to co-exist. Gabi led a research team in Namibia to test ways to reduce cheetah-livestock conflict, and designed a picture-only video game, “Operation Ferdinand”,  with a colleague, software engineer Jaymie Krambeck, to teach different ways to identify carnivore species in southern Africa and prevent livestock losses to carnivore predation. As co-founders of the indie game studios “Bright Frog Game Studios”, they believe deeply in games for change and interactive methods for environmental education. 

Gabi will also soon be testing nonlethal deterrents to safely keep species such as cheetahs, leopards, and African wild dogs off farms in the Ghanzi district of Botswana as part of a PhD project at the University of Wisconsin-Madison in collaboration with community-centered NGO Cheetah Conservation Botswana. 

Listen in on our exclusive interview with Gabriela Fleury, as we explore the ethical considerations when solving for human-wildlife conflict. 

Jaymie and I are always open to collaboration with new and exciting partners when it comes to games for change and different interactive methods to approach complex environmental problems, such as testing “Operation Ferdinand” in multiple locations and environmental education programs. 

 

More broadly, I love discussing innovative methods to mitigate issues such as carnivore-livestock conflict, so definitely get in touch if you’re currently working in that space, especially in eastern or southern Africa!

 

                                                                                        - Gabi Fleury

Explore the links below to learn more about Gabriela and the extraordinary work they are undertaking:

• Recent article from Nelson Institute, UW-M
• Science Friday interview (National Radio)
• Forbes 30 under 30 Profile
• Bright Frog Game Studios Website

If you'd like to get in touch with Gabriela, please follow the linktree here. 

In the meantime, stay tuned on WILDLABS to meet more conservation experts mitigating human-wildlife conflict across the continent in new and innovative ways, and check out our article here for more information on human-wildlife mitigation East African projects powered by conservation tech!

Thanks to Gabriela Fleury for talking with us, sharing photos and details with the WILDLABS community!