Ratty NGO recognised in world's top 25 humanitarian orgs
A group of lifesaving rats has been recognised amongst the top 25 NGO teams in the world…
Not just the rats but the team that trains them as well.
And also the charity’s founder Belgian engineer Bart Weetjens.
APOPO the charity organisation which prepares rats for humanitarian de-mining and other lifesaving work, including sniffing out diseases, has been recognised by the Global Journal for its innovation and effectiveness.
The Geneva and New York based magazine that examines global governance has announced its inaugural Top 100 Best NGOs list which aims to celebrate the positive impact of NGOs on a global scale.
The Global Journal list features many of the well-known NGOs and charities that you might expect, including Oxfam, Amnesty International, Save the Children, the WWF, Partners in Health, etc...
The list is also notable for sticking the Wikimedia Foundation at number one, celebrating the often unrecognised impact the Wikipedia website's charity foundation has throughout the world, promoting and providing free education resources.
However, what might be called the fastest rising star is the much admired charity APOPO which is listed at 24 and is developing a worldwide reputation for its vital and innovative work training and using rats for humanitarian purpose.
The Global Journal celebrates APOPO's achievements on behalf of its HeroRATs, including the clearance of more than two million square metres of minefield land for reuse by the population of Mozambique...
At its heart the listing also recognises the genius of APOPO founder Bart Weetjens who like many innovators appears to have had a brilliant idea that was simply far outside the box, as it were, and so took some time to be recognised.
Jokes about rats aside his insistence that rats - with their fine-honed sense of smell, intelligence and acute ability to be trained for a variety of purposes - were a cost-effective and also completely humane alternative to other forms of de-mining, including the use of humans, dogs as well as various technologies, is the stuff of a true entrepreneur who in this case has given his idea to a great humanitarian cause rather than profit-making.
Despite his idea initially being scoffed at Weetjens finally secured a research grant in 1997 which led to APOPO and its many subsequent achievements today...
Some of APOPO's latest innovations include training detection rats for remote scent tracing projects focusing on detecting amongst other things salmonella bacteria. Also preliminary research into the CameRAT application is underway which involves training rats to search for humans, which could have amazing lifesaving potential.
Hats off to the APOPO team for their latest recognition for the inspired work they do... and that includes the humans on the team not just the rats...
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