Smartphone Icon User Interface design for non-literate trackers and its implications for an inclusive citizen science

1. What they did

The authors are Louis Liebenberg, software developer Justin Steventon, and five Kalahari and Karoo trackers who helped develop the software in the field. They describe the CyberTracker Icon User Interface, first developed in 1996 so that expert trackers who cannot read or write could record complex, geo-referenced field data. They review seven case studies of its use, and discuss what this means for a citizen science that includes everyone, regardless of literacy, education or culture.

2. What they found

Tracking, science and inclusion

• Tracking involves creating working hypotheses from signs, knowledge of behaviour and terrain, then testing and revising them. The authors call this hypothetico-deductive reasoning, and suggest scientific reasoning may be an innate ability of the human mind.
• Non-literate (“oralate”) trackers have co-authored scientific papers.
• Inclusion is also seen from the trackers’ side. The CyberTracker certification system, developed over 20 years to recognize traditional skills, now also certifies professional scientists in the USA and Europe. Mark Elbroch was the first tracker outside Africa to receive the Master Tracker certificate.
• The authors place this work within models of public participation in research, from contributory projects to “collegial” research by independent amateurs.

From theory to practice

• In 1991, !Nate Brahman asked Liebenberg to help, because fences had decimated wildlife in the central Kalahari and the trackers could no longer live as hunter-gatherers. They decided to create jobs by developing tracking into a modern profession.
• CyberTracker started in 1996 as a University of Cape Town Honours project. Karel Benadie and James Minye field-tested it in Karoo National Park, monitoring many species and tracking individual rhinos. As far as the authors know, it was the first icon interface that let non-literate users enter complex data.
• Benadie and Minye co-authored a 1999 paper on rhino feeding behaviour, based on a hypothesis Benadie proposed and data they gathered independently. This may be the first paper co-authored by two non-literate trackers.
• Khwe trackers ran wildlife transects in Caprivi, Namibia, from 1999. Keeping hardware and software working in the Kalahari was a major problem.
• A 2001 pilot at Lone Tree showed that Karoha Langwane could collect data, download it, view it on maps and recharge the batteries, but it lacked funding to pay trackers.
• From 2008, the Western Kgalagadi Conservation Corridor Project employed !Xo and /Gwi trackers for animal track counts. Some were later employed in track-survey research.

Social and cultural benefits

• The trackers took ownership of the technology and call themselves “Cyber trackers”. !Nate referred to his knowledge as his “CyberTracker”.
• They valued learning, teaching younger trackers, and knowing their observations were stored and “will not disappear”.
• Trackers and the scientist on the corridor project learned from each other.
• Using the computer brought prestige to trackers who had been held in low esteem, and gave them an incentive to refine their skills.

South African national parks

• CyberTracker was adopted in Kruger National Park from 2000, with up to 120 units on daily patrols, and is now used in all South African national parks.
• Patrol data support patrol planning, early warning of disease, tracking illegal entry and exit points, invasive species control, and research.
• With rhino poaching at crisis level, about 500 Kruger rangers were receiving intensive tracker training, and the software was being upgraded for real-time anti-poaching monitoring.

Australia

• The National Indigenous Ranger CyberTracker Project uses fully customizable data applications. Rangers helped design the questions, and the government has funded ranger employment since 2007.

Ebola in central Africa

• During the 2001 to 2003 Ebola outbreaks in Gabon and the Republic of the Congo, CyberTracker patrol data based on tracks and signs showed gorillas present before the outbreak and absent afterwards over a large area. They also showed sharp drops in signs of gorillas, chimpanzees, duikers and bush pigs.
• Wildlife outbreaks began before each of the five human outbreaks. Twice, health authorities were alerted to an imminent risk weeks before human outbreaks occurred.

Sustainability

• Most citizen science relies on volunteers in wealthy countries. Most indigenous trackers live in poverty.
• The most successful programmes have government-funded jobs, as in national parks, or are on land owned by indigenous communities.
• The Kalahari trackers who contributed most to developing CyberTracker have, ironically, received the least economic benefit, because their projects lacked sustainable funding.

3. What they concluded

• Expert trackers who cannot read or write can gather complex, rich biodiversity data. When employed in large numbers over long periods, they can collect data that cannot be gathered any other way, especially in poorly covered regions and for rare and endangered species, since they can track down individual animals.
• Tracker monitoring can give early warning of disease outbreaks such as Ebola, and trackers can play a critical role against poaching.
• An inclusive citizen science would let anyone contribute original science.
• Community-based citizen science in developing countries will need international support to be sustainable.
• The paper is dedicated to !Nate Brahman, who died on 20 January 2016, after the first draft was submitted.

4. How tracking was or was not used

The paper reviews projects in which trackers used CyberTracker to record observations of tracks and signs. These include tracking individual rhinos in Karoo National Park, wildlife transects and animal track counts in the Kalahari and Caprivi, ranger patrols, and monitoring signs of gorillas and other species in central Africa. No new tracking data were collected for this paper.

5. Tracker or observer certification

Reported but not validated. The trackers in the case studies are described as expert traditional trackers, but no certification or test of their skill is reported. The paper describes the CyberTracker tracker certification system, developed over 20 years to recognize traditional tracking skills and now awarded in Africa, the USA and Europe. It notes Mark Elbroch as the first tracker outside Africa to receive the Master Tracker certificate.

6. Other technologies, skills or innovations

• An Icon User Interface lets non-literate users enter complex data. A map view shows icons for each data point, so trackers can interpret their own data. Icons and alias names also help overcome language barriers.
• The hardware changed over time: 1996 (version 1), Apple Newton handheld wired to a Garmin GPS; 1999 (version 2), PalmPilot wired to a Garmin GPS; 2001, Handspring Visor with a Magellan GPS Companion, plus a solar-powered desktop computer in the village of Kagcae; 2008 (version 3), Windows Mobile handheld with built-in GPS; later, smartphones.
• Real-time monitoring for anti-poaching was in development.

7. Implications for conservation (from the paper)

• Trackers can fill gaps in biodiversity monitoring in developing countries, help prevent poaching of rhino, elephant and tigers, and monitor rare and endangered species.
• Community wildlife monitoring may give early warning of disease outbreaks in wildlife before they reach people.
• Involving local communities improves management responses and speeds up decision-making. Without them, monitoring tends to stay an isolated academic exercise.
• Biodiversity monitoring is a global concern, and community-based monitoring in developing countries needs international support to last.