Community

Kagera Safaris is committed to providing authentic African travel experiences for travellers in Uganda, Rwanda, Kenya and Tanzania. We organize handcrafted; gorilla tracking, chimpanzee tracking, bird watching, wildlife safaris, culture and community tours. The company offers Destination Management to companies from across the globe. We deliver a combination of luxury, attention to detail, adventure and exclusive safaris combining the best of East Africa while partnering with camps and lodges that offer the best possible stay. Our experienced team continually invests in discovering new activities and itineraries that give the best experience delivered by our passionate guides.

We aim to be a recognised as an innovative world leader in creating and managing memorable, intercultural tourism experiences in East Africa.

We want to improve the East Africa tourism experience for local communities and people from around the world; by providing memorable personalized holidays with professional first-class guiding services that promote East Africa as a leading tourism destination.

Our aim is to have travellers enjoy the destination without destroying it. And to have local communities benefit and enjoy hosting travellers. It is amazing how clients leave with a connection to a community because of being hosted and experiencing the life more deeply. The biggest highlight has been when they overnight in a homestead and get involved in cooking and gardening.

1. We employ locals – site guides (community guides) in addition to the tour guide on our trips when travellers visit the community. For our birding tours in the Bwindi impenetrable national park, we employ locals who have lived at the edge of the forest for years to join the team and guide.
2. We purchase ‘welcome gifts’ for our clients from locals.
3. The lodges we use train and employ local people from the community adjacent to them.
4. For the long run, conservation cannot be done by ‘outsiders’. Local communities have co-existed with wildlife and the environment for many years before there was population pressure on land and demand for animal parts. We visit local communities and pay for participation in different activities. This ensures that locals earn directly from tourism which leads them to appreciate the wildlife and environment and therefore refuse to participate as poachers or destroy environment in the short term.
5. We have worked with Nzuguto Environmental Conservation Association to conserve the wetland in the community. We also contributed towards purchase of music and dance instruments to help the members earn by performing at various lodges.

1. We do not print hardcopy itineraries for clients. We share these online and the clients have access to them to save paper. We also recycle paper in the office, if a one side is printed on, we use the other side for another printing or draft work. Overall we avoid printing.
2. We have flexible working from home arrangements with the staff. This reduces on commute time and vehicle movements which emit toxins in the environment.
3. We conduct maintenance of our vehicles regularly to ensure full efficiency and reduced carbon emissions and to also ensure clients are comfortable and safe.
4. Clients are given reusable water bottles to get only the water they need. This way water is not wasted and the environment is not affected by too many plastic bottles. The lodges also give them options of re-using towels and bedsheets to avoid wastage of water.
5. Travellers are not allowed to get out of safari vehicles while on a game drive in the national park. They however have opportunities while on a hiking or walking safari. They cannot get off the trail as informed by both the guides and ranger. They are also not allowed to dispose of their rubbish in these areas or pick plants.
6. Clients are advised on electricity conservation such as having short showers to avoid water and electricity wastage
7. We mostly work with small lodges that often use renewable energy like solar power.
8. We provide suggestions for both day visits and overnight into different communities. The traveller can then decide to spend only a few hours visiting the community on a village walk or visit a homestead, get involved in the house work, cook a meal together with the hosts and enjoy it after.
9.  

1. We send a travel pack to clients with information they need traveling in the destination. This travel pack includes information on how the clients ought to interact with locals and their culture. For example, do not photograph people without their permission. Listen to locals and be open to learning about their culture.
2. For the tours we sell, we encourage travellers to visit communities for a few hours or for days depending on their interests. Some of the communities have products like crafts, baskets, honey, coffee which the clients can purchase while on the visit.
3. For every client we receive, we put 10 USD into the community fund. We encourage clients to consider giving more towards this. This money goes to contributing to school tution, purchase of text books and fiction books for local schools. We also look forward to purchasing science laboratory equipment’s with increased finances. We realise these are areas that are often under looked in schools and yet are needed by students and teachers.
4. We contribute to emergency efforts in the event of disasters and crises in areas surrounding national parks and tourism sites. This helps lift the burden off the communities and they appreciate tourism knowing we are connected with in all times.
5. We partner with Community Initiative for Children at Risk by giving them part of the funds we receive (The  $10 per client) and percentage of our profits.
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In March, 2021, six of Uganda’s famous tree-climbing lions were poisoned and dismembered by members of his very own community.  This affected Eric Ndorere (founder) greatly and one of the many reasons why he’s so passionate about the Lights for Lions Uganda deterrent system as well as establishing a Community Center where locals can be sensitized, realize the benefits of preserving their natural heritage and how to co-exist alongside wildlife.

We recently partnered with Save Wildlife Uganda by giving part of our profits to purchase material that women can use in basketry.