#Voluntourism or internships bring in important financial contributions to many small NGOs in developing countries but are often seen in a negative light. We wrote a small piece highlighting the value of research from small marine NGOs in South Africa bit.ly/2ZGNQly

This was not 'in response to' the recent letter to Marine Mammalogy but was brewing for some time. We hope these thoughts have relevance to the discussions started by Dr Eiren Jacobson et al and provide a perspective from #Africa and the small NGO sector and a caution re 'blanket bans'.

We absolutely fully support increasing diversity in all fields but many groups like ours are in a continual battle for survival while trying to compete at an international level research wise. The problems faced in the developing world are different to those in the first world..

We caution that actions which done to help things in the developed world may have different impacts outside it. Despite having the highest marine mammal diversity of all continents - Africa remains one of the most poorly studied areas. I'll leave it there. Read the article :)

It is perhaps worth noting - that in the above mentioned letter with over 680 signatories (when I looked on Friday), I could find only 2 from African institutes (both RSA) and 3 from Asian institutes. Perhaps GLOBAL diversity is a bigger challenge in #marinemammalscience ?