We spend on average $65,000 a month, or per year: $780,000. Since 2007, we’ve spent 2.6 million USD.
In short, our money goes to 3 things:
- people
- equipment
- food and fuel
1. What we spend on Congolese salaries:
Our salaries are considered very good and workers often work week-ends, holidays, and long hours in the forest.
The Lomami National Park, a park in the making, needs all of them.
Our team’s composition
- 30 field-team leaders, field assistants, camp managers, town coordinators, and dugout helmsmen/drivers on yearlong contracts,
- 28 forest trackers, guides, camp cooks and trail blazers on monthly wage,
- Approximately 600 man-days per month of daily labor including porters, scouts, trail cooks, and bicycle transporters. Some of these have been with us for years.
What is everyone paid?
- Contract workers vary from $300 a month to $ 1300 a month.
- Director and Scientific director have the top salaries at $5000 a month.
- Monthly workers vary from $150 a month to $ 300 a month.
- Daily-wage workers get from $3.5 a day to $ 10 a day depending on the job.
Henri, one of our team leaders, in a pygmy camp near Obenge.
How do these compare with other Congolese salaries?
- A foot soldier in the army supposedly earns $60 a month, but may receive pay only irregularly;
- A contract-wage laborer at the factory next to us in Kinshasa earns $120/m.
2. Equipment and Operations
There are a few big items that we have to renew on a yearly, or near yearly, basis:
- A used car in Kinshasa. The current car bought February 2012, cost $10,300, a used Toyota corolla;
- At least one motorbike a year — to keep a fleet of 6 running. In Kisangani, with legal papers, one new Yamaha AG100 (the workhorse motorbike over these roads) costs $4500;
- Three dugouts. The dugout we bought in December for the Lomami River, hollowed out from a Gossweilerodendron balsamiferum tree, is even larger than the one we bought less than a year earlier on the Lualaba. It cost $4000;
- 25 horsepower outboard motors go for $4000 in Kisangani.
- Computers for field use (with software, anti-virus and pelican case) – $1800;
- Small generators (in each major field camp and town bases) – $850,
- Printers at town bases -$350,
- Bicycles that actually move more of our equipment than motorbikes. These Chinese-made clunkers are rebuilt soon after purchase -$120.
- GPS – Garmin 62series – $250,
- Thurayas – sat phones – $1200,
- Field data books (Rite N Rain) – we need a lot – $14,
- Tents – many small tents rather than a few large tents are the best – $175,
- Solar battery kit with charger – $170,
- Rollable solar panel – $210
- and the list is longer…
Helmsman, Papa Bolenga, turns our smallest of 3 dugouts around.
3. Food and fuel
- Rations: $3500 per month for field camps and field bases – annually $42,000,
- Fuel: $320 per barrel in Kisangani, we are buying about 60 barrels a year, so $19,200/yr,
- Medicine kits : $1500 per month or $18,000/yr (includes medical check ups and treatment when team members come into town bases; in the field, village first aid as well as our teams),
- Communication – by thuraya, by internet, by mobile phone…altogether about $2000/mo or $24,000/yr.
- And the list is longer…
And there is always a special project: radio show, village outreach, a special provincial meeting to discuss hunting.
Gillain, our driver in Maniema, is balancing a new motorbike across a single-log bridge after a heavy rain.
