[caseyslaught]

I work for a national park in the Democratic Republic on the Congo as a tech lead. Some of the things we are doing: LoRaWAN for tracking and emergency response, ML to identify gorillas by their unique nose prints, and long-range drones for mapping and surveillance, and a management web app.

If you’re interested in conservation / sustainable development and associated technologies let me know! Always looking to collaborate and bounce ideas off others.

[kallewirsch]

How does one find a job like that, it sounds amazing! I originally studied environmental science before having worked as a Data Scientist and now Data Engineer for the past 4 years. I worked a lot with geospatial data and sat images. Ultimately I would love to combine both again and use these skills to do something useful for the environment. If anyone has links to orgs/companies that do relevant work and hire (or wants to collaborate) I would be keen to hear. Thanks!

[loganbyers]

Big fan of the environmental sciences over here. You might look for jobs and opportunities at nonprofits/NGOs as places where applied research and interventions are occurring. Mission-driven organizations, including government ministries, are a good way to feel like the hours you spend at work are directed towards something positive in the world. In some cases like the GP these sound like direct actions in the field - which sounds really enriching.

NGOs jobs tend to be structured on topics as much as on functions, so making a shortlist of topical keywords might be helpful in the search to become aware of organizations. You should also look directly at organizations' staff lists, which are typically fairly open and have emails listed. One thing to be aware of is many nonprofits have tightly budgeted projects with specific needs, so getting your foot in the door on a less interesting project might be needed. Generalists can benefit here.

I know a few job sites that collect these kind of positions, some techy and some not:

https://techjobsforgood.com/

https://nextbillion.net/jobs/

https://greenjobs.greenjobsearch.org/

https://www.devex.com/jobs/search/

Last I will mention the nonprofit organization I work for - World Resources Institute (https://wri.org). We organize our work around seven global challenges: food, forests, water, the ocean, energy, climate, and cities. We do research, build data products and applications, organize partnerships. We help tackle some the largest questions related to how we collectively transition to a world where more than 9 billion humans have their food and energy needs met through fair economic and environmental systems.

[secfirstmd]

Hi there.

Seeing as you are in DRC. I've worked on a number of projects there. Maybe you might be interested in checking out an app we made to help NGO/media etc learn about and manage their digital and physical security? Lots of groups on the ground there have used it in situations like kidnap, targeted malware etc.

It's called Umbrella. It's free, opens source, on ios and Android available in many languages. If you are interested, have a look at at https://www.secfirst.org or ping me via the email in my profile! :)

[javajosh]

>Umbrella...kidnap, targeted malware

This looks like a behavioral modification tool, to prevent kidnap, etc. Two questions: is there a scenario database of DRC "actualized risk", that describe real kidnaps, extortion, etc ideally with root cause analysis? What is your revenue model[1]? Okay, 3 questions: what do you think of tools like what NSO provides for client recovery?

1 - Speculation: do you make revenue by providing a marketplace where security service providers can market to consumers?

[secfirstmd]

Good questions.

So at the moment the advice we give is not country specific. We have slightly different levels depending on risk, threat model and skill. Building a logic to do country by country was something we tried but is incredibly hard.

Our revenue model is based on a few things. We got grants to build the initial version, we also create paid white label versions for organisations that want their own and we do security training and consultancy services.

Regarding NSO Group. Well considering we work every day with journalists and activists, some of whom have been targeted by NSO...to say we despise what NSO does is probably an understatement.

[caseyslaught]

Awesome thanks for sharing! I can see this being helpful for us as well.

[jwillmer]

My company offers digital processes solutions - like dynamic checklists - for remote locations (vessels, trucks, airplanes, inspections) with no (constant) internet connection. Get in touch with me if that is something your park could benefit from.

[shafyy]

That sounds super interesting. Two questions: 1) Do you work remotely or are you in DRC? 2) What are some good ways to find job opportunities at the intersection of software engineering and wildlife conversation?

[caseyslaught]

I spent two years working in DRC and have now moved to a remote position (based in the US). There are a few organizations I've worked with that do great work: Allen Institute for AI (EarthRanger), SmartParks.org and Conservation X Labs. There are surely others, but these offer products directly to national parks to improve their capabilities.

[shafyy]

Awesome, thanks for the recommendations.

[koide]

I know some communities that are aiming at climate in general and not focused on wildlife specifically but may have some related opportunities. Work On Climate, climate action tech and my climate journey.

PS: I love that autocorrect.

[s7r]

Are you personally involved in any climate projects / looking to collaborate?

[koide]

Yes to both

[shafyy]

Thanks! Haha, it wasn't even autocorrect. Just tired from NYE I guess :D

[petargyurov]

> ML to identify gorillas by their unique nose prints

Really cool stuff. I wonder if face detection is sufficient too? It has been proven to work for brown bears [0].

I have also been doing some open source work [1] to democratise object detection in this space but I haven't had the time to make improvements to the project in a while.

* [0] http://bearresearch.org/

* [1] https://github.com/petargyurov/megadetector-gui

[caseyslaught]

In fact, we are basically doing facial detection based on cropped photos of gorillas around the nose. Thanks for the links! I'll be sure to check it out.

[atlasunshrugged]

Hey! Curious what impact you've seen of the mining sector in the country but especially towards wildlife and economic development? I have heard the country wants to move up the value chain too, any feelings on whether doing something like processing (requires lots of skilled workers and 24/7 power) is actually realistic? Do you have any recommendations/travel guides for someone who would want to come visit and not just stay in the capitol?

[caseyslaught]

You're definitely right that DRC wants to move up the value chain. Most raw materials are shipped out of the country for processing or smuggled to neighboring states (gold). However, the impact on wildlife is most certainly negative. The economic development impact is pretty unclear; DRC has shown time and again that mineral wealth is equitably distributed. Despite the jobs some new processing plants might afford, the profits from these operations will likely just line the pockets of those in charge.

[atlasunshrugged]

On the latter point, interesting, maybe I'll try to dig up some research on what the counterfactual would be if there was no mining industry; my understanding is that while the conditions are terrible, it does provide jobs for hundreds of thousands if not millions. In regards to distribution of gains... yeah, seems like the whole world is failing at that one, just more egregious in a place where people are starving or having to become child soldiers. That being said, what's the alternative here? Mining companies will come because of the resources and I see no other angle for the DRC to industrialize other than the control they have on the mineral wealth.

[NicoJuicy]

How likely would it be to opensource projects like this?

I think many programmers want to do something good ( preferably by learning) and are willing to spend time on projects like this.

[caseyslaught]

Quite likely! I'm planning on making the gorillas identification project open source as there's actually quite a lot to it (the core AI functionality, management of lots of images and gorillas data, making sure it all works fine on a crappy connection with old Androids).

[NicoJuicy]

That's interesting! I definitely wish you the best of luck.

Ps. Don't forget to submit it here ;)!

[keraf]

This sounds incredibly interesting and would love to know more about it. Where to read more or get in touch with you? (your profile doesn't mention any contacts or links)

[caseyslaught]

Hey I just added me email to my profile. Happy to share more directly!

[cinntaile]

How do you take the nose prints? Do you tranquilize them and then literally press their nose against a piece of paper covered in an inklike material or is it photo based?

[capableweb]

I don't know if Gorillas work the same way as dogs, but maybe you could put something that smells nice on a device that extends a small nose-boop extractor arm when close, and gather the noseprint that way.

To simulate this invention:

- have a dog

- put something smelly on your thumb

- extend arm to point thumb towards dog

- as the dog is within 5-10cm radius of your thumb, press your thumb against their nose (and say the obligatory "boop")

- imagine your had something to extract noseprints from their nose on your thumb

[gaetgu]

It actually looks like they use photos.

https://gorillafund.org/karisoke-research-center/noseprints-...

[capableweb]

Probably a good idea with photos from afar, as dogs and gorillas can probably have very different reactions to whole the "nose-booping" thing.

[caseyslaught]

I guess facial recognition is a more apt description. We just use photos of wild gorillas cropped around the nose. Not intrusive at all!

[Jloerakker]

What ML framework or Lang you working in?

[caseyslaught]

For now we are using Azure Custom Vision and have a working demo that achieves solid results. This seems sufficient for now. This will fit into a web app that uses React and Django.

[agumonkey]

Pretty awesome. Do you know more about other projects like this or what new ideas are going on in DRC ?

[caseyslaught]

I can really only speak to conservation to Congo. One thing I've noticed is that conservation organizations in DRC take on a lot more responsibilities than just wildlife conservation. In Virunga National Park, for example, the park has built and operates a power utility to provide an alternative to charcoal. This is made up of four run-of-the-river hydroelectric plants, hundreds of kilometers of distribution lines (high and medium tension), and smart meters to connect customers. You can check out virunga.org to learn more!

[s7r]

Are you interested in collabing on projects like these? Feel free to message me, contact on profile, exploring economic alternatives to extraction and local economic empowerment/autonomy initiatives

[iev6]

This is a great usecase for ML!

Where can I read more about this part of your work?

[caseyslaught]

It's still pretty early days for this project so I haven't published anything yet. Hopefully soon!

[k8sToGo]

Is LoRaWAN tracking the gorillas?

[caseyslaught]

LoRaWAN is used for an alert system in an area where local communities are threatened by an armed group called the ADF (aka ISIS-DRC). In the future we hope to roll out a large-scale LoRaWAN to monitor wildlife (elephants, lions) as well as vehicles and rangers on patrol.

Gorilla tracking devices are likely to be intrusive and cumbersome for them. They are also known to help each other out and remove devices. For now, gorillas are tracked on foot by a team of rangers.