A UNIQUE Heritage Lottery Fund-backed project aimed at creating wildlife warriors of the future has been unveiled by Chester Zoo.
Aimed at promoting natural heritage conservation, the new project will help step up the response to the threats - habitat loss, pollution and climate change -facing biodiversity in the UK.
As well as being equipped with a conservation toolkit, the new trainees will be given skills to help them find employment in the environment sector in the future.
The first project of its kind to be run by a zoo, eight placements will be provided over a four-year period.
The conservation project has been made possible thanks to a grant from the Heritage Lottery Fund (HLF) under its Skills for the Future programme and will be supported by expertise from Cheshire Wildlife Trust and RECORD, Cheshire’s local biological records centre.
The first batch of trainees is expected to start in 2011 and they will be taught skills including habitat management and monitoring, species husbandry, population management, horticulture, botany and digital technology skills.
Sarah Bird, Chester Zoo’s biodiversity officer, said: “Securing this funding is not just great news for the zoo but great news for conservation. It will have superb benefits for conservation by increasing the capacity for working with and promoting UK wildlife.
“Trainees will gain an unrivalled and extremely diverse programme of work experience through work at Chester Zoo and with our partners Cheshire Wildlife Trust and record.
“We have always been aware of the problem of limited work experience when recruiting for conservation jobs; it is a very difficult thing to overcome as not everyone can afford to do voluntary work to obtain the necessary skills.
“This project will support trainees whilst providing an exceptional opportunity to gain diverse work experience, which can be adapted to their own interests and needs.”
The trainees will be given access to experienced wildlife experts and ecologists and part of their training will be carried out on local nature reserves.
The programme will also allow greater conservation contributions to be made to local and national Biodiversity Action Plans and other conservation schemes.