8/8/2019 South China Morning Post Camel Milk

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Having camelmilk splashedover yourbreakfast cerealmight notsound veryappealing, butfor tens ofmillions ofpeople across

Africa, Central Asia and the MiddleEast the produce is known as liquidgold. A saltier but far healthieralternative to cows milk, it is used tomake cheese and chocolate, orconsumed in the belief that it canfight diseases such as HIV-Aids andtuberculosis. Its a key ingredient ofcosmetics made in the Middle East.

Yet, despite being the lifeblood ofcountries where camels are themain form of livestock, camel milk isrelatively unheard of elsewhere.Changing that is the mission of a trioof young filmmakers who are usingHong Kong as the production base

forRespect the Camel, adocumentary about these unsungships of the desert.

Travelling through 15 countriesin Africa and Asia on a shoestringbudget, Alicia Sully, SebastianLindstrom and Philippa Young areworking on a homage to the camelwith a film that also provides aninsight into the nomadiccommunities for whom camel milkis vital. Above all, it reveals howvaluable a commodity it is.

Camel milk is the new oil. Thatsounds like a joke, but people whoknow about it prize it because itsprecious and hard to get. Its only amatter of time before the rest of theworld finds out about it and tries toget a piece of the action, says Sully,27, a former Peace Corps volunteerwho grew up in Washington.

Theres no doubting camel milkshealth benefits. Not only does itcontain three times the amount ofvitamin C found in cows milk, itsrich in iron, vitamin B andunsaturated fatty acids. In Africa, it is

believed to be beneficial for peoplesuffering from HIV-Aids, while inKazakhstan, Mongolia andSomaliland it is given to patients

recovering from everything fromanaemia to tuberculosis. It is alsosaid to ease symptoms of autism.

There are already signs thatcamel milks potential is beingnoticed. With the UN Food andAgriculture Organisation (FAO)estimating an untapped marketworth US$10 billion a year for camelmilk and dairy products, the firstcamel dairies have already sprungup in Europe and the US. Prices aremoving upwards as camel herdersfrom Abu Dhabi to Uzbekistanrealise that they are literally sittingon a prized commodity.

In the Gobi Desert in Mongoliaat the moment, camel milk is sellingfor US$2 a litre. In parts of EastAfrica, the price is US$1.50 a litre, sothe market is worth a lot of money,says Anthony Bennett, the FAOsdairy expert. There is a highdemand for camel milk. Before, itwas mainly from the countries inwhich the milk is produced, but now

some of the big supermarket chainsin the US and Europe are saying theyare interested in stocking camel milkand camel dairy products.

Camel milk devotees claim it isaddictive. I do prefer it to cowsmilk and have to drink some everyday, says Nancy Abeiderrahmane,an Englishwoman who set up theworlds first professional cameldairy, Tiviski, in Mauritania, in 1989.It somehow rehydrates your bodyinstantly and makes you feelrefreshed. Actually, camel milk is acomplete food for humans. You canlive on it alone for weeks with nodamage.

Abeiderrahmane, who has livedin the West African nation since1969, partly inspired Respect theCamelthanks to her pioneeringwork as a camel cheese maker.Having originally planned to make adocumentary about little-knowncheeses around the world, thefilmmakers decided to focus oncamel cheese when they l earnedabout it.

It combines this evocativeimage ofArabian Nightsandcaravans through the Sahara withthe fact that camels have supported

humans in some of the harshestenvironments in the world forthousands of years, says Young, 23,from England.

But although camel milk hasbeen around as long as camels, thecheese is a relatively new product.Unlike cow or goat milk, camel milkdoesnt curdle naturally. It wasntuntil 1993, when a French expertfrom the FAO working with theTiviski Dairy discovered an enzymethat could curdle camel milk, thatmaking camel cheese becamepossible.

A year later, the Tiviski Dairyproduced Caravane, a creamy, brie-like soft cheese that was quicklydubbed Camelbert. Cheeseconnoisseurs speak approvingly of

Caravanes earthy qualities but,despite being exported to a fewupmarket delis in New York, it hasyet to find a big overseas market. Inpart, thats because the EuropeanUnion bans food imports fromMauritania, as it does from mostcountries that produce camel milkproducts.

In July, however, the Cameliciousdairy in Dubai, which makeschocolate as well as milk, becamethe first camel dairy to be granted aprovisional export licence by the EU.If it passes further health checks, itscamel milk will hit supermarketshelves in Europenext year.

Export restrictions are not the

only hump camel milk has toovercome before it becomes morewidespread. Traditionally, camelherders and nomads regard selling

camel milk as an ignoble practice.Then theres the fact that a camelproduces less milk, around 7.5 litresa day, than the average cow, whichcan churn out 26 litres. Nor arecamels as placid as cows when itcomes to being milked.

Yet the benefits of the trade to theoverwhelmingly rural and poorcommunities that supply the milkare huge. The impact of the dairysurprised even me,Abeiderrahmane says. It has beenenormous. We have up to 1,000suppliers and most of them havemoved out of poverty. The lifestylechanges are sometimes spectacular.

We dont have any data on it,but we know that the nomads wouldnot have been supplying milk to thedairy punctually morning andevening without a reason.

The FAO aims to ensure that thatsuppliers of camel milk get a fair dealwhen the trade goes global. We areworking to raise awareness of this

product and were trying to organisean international camel trade fair tobring producers and consumerstogether, Bennett says. But ourcore concern is seeing that the smalland medium producers of camelmilk benefit in terms of both incomeand food security.

Raising the profile of little-knowncommunities in the developingworld is what inspired Sully andLindstrom, a University of HongKong graduate from Sweden, tomake documentaries. Calling theirproduction company the What TookYou So Long Foundation, Sully andLindstroms first film followed thework of grass-roots NGOs acrossAfrica. While editing the film inHong Kong they recruited Young,who was working in the city as atravel guide editor.

Small NGOs do amazing workon the ground, but they often haveproblems reaching out for fundingand volunteers on the global stage.Filming their work helps themspread their message and so

possibly redefine their position inthe international community. Thatin turn enhances their ability to dogood in the communities they workin, Lindstrom, 26, says.

Its the same with camel milkand cheese; a film about itmay raiseawareness and help develop it into alucrative business that will changethe lives of theherders andnomads.

The trio rely on crowd-funding,whereby individuals around theworld pledge small amounts ofmoney via the internet to raise theirbudgets, and use social media likeTwitter and Facebook to findcontacts and volunteers in thecountries they travel to. Its a newmodel of filmmaking that is likely tobecome standard for manydocumentary makers, withincreasingly fewer televisionchannels prepared to invest indocumentaries.

Crowd-funding is the ultimate

form of collaboration, because ifnobody likes what you are doingthen youre doomed. It pushesgood projects to the next level, whilebad ones fall by the wayside,Lindstrom says.

Soon youre going to see moreand more skeleton film crews likeours with small, high-definitioncameras and big support networkscircling the globe and following theirpassion.. . . . . . . . . . . . . . .. . . . . . . . . . . . . .. . . . . . . . . . . . . . .. . . . . . . . . .The What Took You So LongFoundation can be contactedat whattookyousolong.org

Our core concern isseeing that the smalland medium

producers of camelmilk benefit in termsof both income andfood security. . . . . . . . . . . . .. . . . . . . . . . . . . . .. . . . . . . . . . . . . . .. . . . . . . . . . .Anthony Bennett, FAO dairy expert

Significant udder

Three Hong Kong-based filmmakers are spreading the wordabout the health benefits of camel milk, writes David Eimer

Camels graze near the West Bank city of Hebron (top); filmmakers Alicia Sully, Sebastian Lindstrom and PhilippaYoung interview a camel cheese maker and his family in Mongolia; a nomad girl with camel in Mongolia. Photos: EPA,SCMP Pictures

www.scmp.com

Biologists wingin the changes. . . . . . . . . . . . . .. . . . . . . . . . . . . . .. . . . . . . . . . . . . . .. . . . . . . . . .Sandra Blakeslee

Mandy Weston stands on a ridge inthe Manzano Mountains, 2,700metres above the Rio Grande Valley,New Mexico, grasping the talons ofa juvenile northern harrier in herright hand.

These are the supermodels ofthe raptor world, she says. Tall andthin. She playfully rotates the birdsbody to reveal that its head remainsin a fixed position, like that of an owl.

Weston is the public liaison for afive-person crew that is spending 10weeks on this mountain observingand banding hawks as they migratefrom North America into Mexicoand further south. This is the firstnorthern harrier of the migrationseason, and the team is ecstatic.

This year, 131biologists andamateur enthusiasts have permits totrap and band the golden eagles,red-tailed hawks, ospreys, kestrels,peregrine falcons and other birds ofprey migrating to their winterhabitats, according to the US Fish

and Wildlife Service.Westons team is working with

HawkWatch International, a non-profit conservation and educationalgroup based in Salt Lake City thatfocuses on birds of prey as indicatorsof ecosystem health. Each autumn,it counts hawks at sites in Oregon,Washington, Montana, Wyoming,New Mexico, Nevada, Arizona andTexas. Birds are captured andbanded at five of the sites.

Over the past 30 years,HawkWatch has counted anestimated 20 million hawks andbanded 125,000.

Hawks face many threats, saysAllen Fish, director of the GoldenGate Raptor Observatory, north ofSan Francisco. As more giant windfarms are erected, an increasing

number of hawks are slashed andkilled by turbine blades. Oil and gasexploration is fragmenting theirhabitat. Urban growth, pesticides,herbicides, electricity lines andclimate change are other factors.

Birds of prey are tricky to catch,however. The term eagle-eyed didnot come out of nowhere. Hawkshave four foveas (the part of the eyethat sees detail) as opposed to ourtwo, the ability to detect reflectedultraviolet light and a greatlyaccelerated visual processing speed.When a hawk dives at a mechanicallure, Fish says, it pulls up 10 to 15metres before the target as if to say,theres something wrong here.

The only way to catch hawks is touse live birds as lures, Fish says.When the juvenile harrierapproaches, two trappers in a hide15 metres below the lookout havetheir lures and nets ready.

The live pigeons, doves andstarlings used to attract the hawksare outfitted in body suits made ofleather or Kevlar. With only their

heads, wings and feet exposed, thebirds stand near the traps or aretossed up to six metres into the air,their feet securely attached to fishinglines manipulated from the hide.

At the Manzano site, three kindsof nets are arrayed on an apron ofground in front of the blind. A mistnet, made of nylon with a large meshand multiple compartments, issuspended between two poles.

A dho-gaza net, with a smallernylon mesh, is affixed to two poles,set to collapse when a hawk flies intoit. A remotely-triggered bow net, ahooplike device with a springmechanism, lies on the ground.

Weston describes what happensnext (HawkWatch would not allow areporter to observe the trappers).When a hawk flies overhead andspots a pigeon on the ground, thetrappers pull on the line attached tothe pigeon to jiggle it, hoping it willpass for a small mammal, thefavoured prey of harriers.

When the hawk strikes, Westonsays, it gets entangled in the mist netbefore it reaches the pigeon.It ismeasured, weighed, checked for fatdeposits under its wing andparasites. The trappers fix a metalband to the birds leg, assigning it anidentity should it be recapturedelsewhere or found dead.

The team has been observingbetween 30 and 200 hawks a day,capturing and banding about 10 percent. The most common have beensharp-shinned hawks, Coopershawks, red-tailed hawks, Americankestrels, golden eagles, northernharriers and Swainsons hawks.. . . . . . . . . . . . . .. . . . . . . . . . . . . . .. . . . . . . . . . . . . .. . . . . . . . . . .The New York Times

This northern harrier has beenmeasured, weighed and banded.Photo: NYT

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SOUTH CHINA MORNING POST FRIDAY,OCTOBER29, 2010 C