Now give me back my dog... (or, to put it another way, what does your consultant do?)

I have (yet another) secret to confess, ever since I heard the one about the consultant and the shepherd (& me being a shepherd of sorts, bigger sheep) I've wanted to jump the fence and become a consultant.  However, with my ageless face and tendency towards tempremental ranting I've never really found anyone willing to pay for my advice, I am confined to offering my advice unasked and for free in these missives you know so well.

However, when the opportunity arose and an old friend, Khun Prasop Tipprasert, (who can rightly claim it was his idea to bring elephants to the Golden Triangle - or at least can claim to have visited this property with elephants in mind while I was still chasing stripy cats around Nepal) took early retirement from his Government job with the Forest Industries Organisation and the Thai Elephant Conservation Centre, I went to the bosses, scraped some satang together and did the next best thing, I hired a consultant for the Golden Triangle Asian Elephant Foundation.

Why?  Well, apart from being a charming young man with a knowledge of elephant lore & mahout stories going back centuries (only yesterday he told me of the local legend of people lining the banks as King Mengrai founded Chiang Saen - way back in the mists of time, back in what we would call the 1200's (& not in the 'just after lunch' way) to see the new King's elephant army swim the Mekong for three days straight) and therefore good to have around camp the main reason is that we believe in many of the other projects on which he consulted (google his name) in the name of the Government and we felt it would be good to allow him to continue consulting on these, his time could be our support of these noble projects.

In order to answer the specific question, asked from several quarters, notably (recently) our accountants, donors and auditors "what does K. Prasop do when he's not on site?" I thought I'd get him to jot down the projects he attended and helped this month.

I think it is worth the cash and fits in with our goals of helping all elephants, not just those under our care.  

Over to K. Prasop:
_________________________

1. "Weekend Clinic for Autism"

10th - 11th July 2010 (the first weekend) at Thai Elephant Conservation Centre (TECC)

-We started the last research program together with Chiangmai University (CMU) therapist team

-Eight children joined us. Two children were from Chiangmai, the other two were from Lampang and the last four were from Chiangrai (our home town)

-The average age of the children is about 10-12year-old.

-In the first week, we had 42 difficult cases, but very good progress.

-We use 4 elephants from TECC

-Prathida, 17 years old female, she is good behavior, gentle and stable.

-Wanaree 12 years old female, she is fast, smart and gentle.

-Neu-oon 6 years old female, she is playful, smart and nuaghty.

-Areena 4 years old female, she is curious, playful and smart.

17th -18th July 2010 (the second weekend)

-All children got on the elephant

-Good development

-Good motor planning

-Better social skills

-Smiling on the parents'  face and the therapists' as well

 

2. "Lecturing given to Chiangmai Mahout Training Program at Maetang Elephant Camp in Chiangmai

Contents:

1.    Training of elephants for eco-tourism.

2.    Security measure in using elephant for tourism.

3.    Elephant trekking and mahout training program of TECC.

4.    Elephant nature and musth phenomenon, elephant welfare.

5.    "Do" and "Don't" information for tourist in TECC

Participant and time frame:

1.    The first group was  held on June, 28-July, 27 2010. There were 120 mahouts and 120 elephants.

2.    The second group will be held on August, 9- September, 8 2010. There will be 120 mahouts and 120 elephants.

All mahouts and elephants come from 18 elephant camp based in Mae-Tang, Chiang-dao district, Chiangmai.

 

3. "Super Pass for Anantara Elephant Camp"

As I was the consultant of the Office of the National Research Council of Thailand setting standard criteria for Thai elephant camp, and we had the draft of the criteria in our hand. So I get into the draft and found very good outcome.

We had got the best score on:

-Handling

-Personnel welfare

-Environment

-Security

-Services

-Social participation

Altogether, we passed 90% score. Right, it's look good, but it's a draft one. Anyway, we know where we are.

Cheers!!!

______________________

PS.  Even though K. Prasop is a legend, one thing he legendarily does not do is type up his notes, so for this we thank the Golden Triangle's other roving ambassador, our very own Cherry Keratimanochaya DVM.

PPS. For the elephant camp standards I am happier with a 90% pass than I would have been 100% as we also sat on the advisory board and the objective was to set a standard that looks out for elephant, mahout & guest welfare, ethical business practices that would be both acceptable to our times and achievable for willing camps in order to give tourists, guests & agents an idea of the standards of a camp before they visit it.  The objective most certainly was not to make all camps clones of ours.

Posted by John Roberts at Fri, 23 Jul 2010 08:11:00 GMT
Categories: Golden Triangle Elephants, Thailand Elephants, Scientific Research in Camp
Tags: Prasop Tipprasert consultant elephants Thai Elephant Therapy Camp Standards mahout training
 
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  • Sun, 25 Jul 2010 07:35:14 GMT Dr Nuntanee Satiensukpong wrote:
    ...here are some photographs from the Thai Elephant Therapy Project for Autistic Children, our first weekend clinics that K. Prasop helped with at the Thai Elephant Conservation Centre:

     











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