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Founding member Association of Uganda Tour Operators (AUTO)

The Uganda Association of Travel Agents (TUGATA)

Africa Travel Association (ATA)

Founding member of Geo-Tourism Council of Uganda

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Government of Uganda,
Ministry of Tourism,
Trade and Industry

ALBERTINE RIFT VALLEY

Distance from Kampala: 200-450 km. Estimated transit time: 3-4 hours

The Alberttine Rift Valley is a globally important endangered space that harbors the majority of Africa's biodiversity. Uganda is a giant in terms of biodiversity although only the size of the state of Oregon. Representing on 0.18% of the world'd terrestrial and freshwater surfaces, Uganda harbors 4.6% of the world's drangonflies, 6.8% of the world's butterflies, 7.5% of the world's mammals and 10.2% of the world's birds. In fact, Uganda currently has 1056+ registered species of birds of some 9000 found worldwide. In comaprison, there are approximately 1000 species of birds for both the United States and Canada combined or for all of Europe.

The majority of Uganda's biodiversity is found in southwestern Uganda along the Albertine Rift Valley. The western arm of Africa's 4,000 mile Great Rift Valley was created by two parallel tectonic plates that crashed together millions of years ago. As the plates pulled apart, huge landslides, erosion and the collapse of the plate edges fromed the rift. The Albertine Rift is edged by some of the continent's highest mountains, including the Virunga, Mitumba and Rwenzori Ranges, and the rift floor includes some of the world's deepest lakes.

The Ugandan portion of the Albertine Rift enjoyed its heyday in the late 1950's and early 1960's when tourists flocked to the game parks around Queen Elizabeth and Murchison Falls, instead of going to Kenya and Tanzania, These parks were homke to more than 30,000 elephants, 7000 rhinos, 10,000 zebras, 26,000 hippos, 60,000 Cape buffalo and 25,000 hartebeest. The Ugandan Albertine Rift had the highest recorded mammalian biomass for any place on Earth. But high human density, conflict and poaching have taken their toll, leaving only about 20% of these levels and rhinos are unfortunately extinct.

The Albertine Rift stretches from the northern tip of Lake Albert in Uganda to the southern tip of Lake Tanganyika in northern Zambia. The natural habitat within this eco-region, comprised of portions of the Democratic Republic of Congo (Zaire), Uganda, Rwanda, Burundi, Zambia and Tanzania, is equally diverse, ranging from glaciers at the top of the fabled Rwenzori Mountains, down through alpine moorland, forest lands and savanna grasslands.

These landscapes support high levels of species richness and endenism. According to Wildlife Conservation Society, the Rift is the most species rich Africanregion for vertebrates, This area of Africa contains 52% of all bird species anf 39% of all mammals species found on the African continent. However, this eco-regionis even more important for the number of endemic species - those that are unique to this area and found no where else on Earth. The Albertine Rift has more endemic species of plants and animals than any other eco-region on the African continent.

The biodiversity can be seen in National Parks and Forest and Reserves in Southwest Uganda including:

But this wealth of wild species is threatened by human activities. Human population growth rates for Uganda approach 3%, while the average world population rate is 1.3%. Human diversity estimates are equally astonishing, with Uganda's national average of 102 people per square kilometer. The six Albertine Rift districts between Kasese and Kisoro along the Democratic Republic of Congo's border have an average of 189 people per square kilometer and id the protected areas and lakes are removed from the analysis, the human density on the remaining land for human occupancy skyrockets to 313 people per square kilometer. In some areas od the Albertine Rift human density approaches 600 people per square kilometer! During the last 15 years, the Ugandan Albertime Rift lost over 800 square kilometers of forest habitat due to the high pressure from neighbouring communities.

The impact of human activity on global biodiversity has prompted conservation and development organizations to define "biodiversity hotspots" as a tool to identify geographical areas that merit immediate attention for priority conservation activities. This concept began in 1988 when an original 10 hotspots were identified, composed of only tropical forests. Later 1991, 8 other hotspots were identified that included other vegetation types. In 2001, that list grew to 25 hotspots. February 2005, another 8 hotspots were identified and the Albertine Rift was "gazetted" in this new wave of endangered spaces. Currently, there are 34 bioversity hotspots identified on the planet. In order to be placed on this conversation black list, an eco-region needs to have high levels of species enderism and to have lost at least 70% of the natural vegetation cover. Unfortunately, the Albertine Rift meets those criteria.

Albertine Rift Valley continues