Water quality course at HOORC

Dr Philippa Huntsman-Mapila in HOORC's Environmental Laboratory

HOORC's two biodiversity projects, Biokavango and the Darwin Initiative's Monitoring and Simulating Threats to Aquatic Biodiversity in the Okavango Delta, are sponsoring a short course on water quality and monitoring in the Okavango Delta at HOORC this week to help build capacity of local users of the Okavango's resources. HOORC researchers Philippa Huntsman-Mapila, Wellington Masamba, Belda Mosepele and Piotr Wolski are providing explanations and responding to questions from government officials, private sector tourism operators and HOORC field staff about biological indicators, sampling methods and water chemistry analysis. Participants also heard a presentation from visiting wetland specialist Professor Bill Mitsch of Ohio State University.

Dr Philippa Huntsman-Mapila, who recently received her PhD in water chemistry from the Universite de Bretagne Occidentale in Brest, is coordinating the course.