The jungle is calling

Old mobile phones in exchange for giving a dignified life to a chimpanzee. This is the charity objective that the Marbella Basket team has set itself.

For some time, this sports club has been collecting old mobile phones to collaborate with the Jane Gooddall Institute and the fruit has already been achieved: Avatel Marbella Basketball team has sponsored Zezé the Brave, a small chimpanzee.

The story of this little primate is tragic: Zezé’s mother was killed by poachers in Angola who wounded the 4-year-old chimpanzee with a machete when he tried to defend her. He lost an eye. That is why he is called Zezé the Brave.

Now the primate from Marbella lives in the sanctuary of Tchimpounga, in the Republic of Congo, where the Jane Goodall Institute attends to the needs of more than 140 chimpanzees. According to Avatel Marbella Basket, “he has adapted to life with his new companions and, although he is missing an eye, this has not been an impediment for him”.

This initiative is part of the Jane Gooddall Institute’s global programme The Rainforest Is Calling Us, which aims to raise awareness of the impact of technological consumption on ecosystems and to advocate responsibility and progress towards a circular economy.

50 million mobile phones

Specifically, in Spain today there are more than 50 million mobile phone lines, for less than 47 million inhabitants, (which includes young children). To this impressive number of handsets must be added those older mobiles that are replaced and that citizens keep or throw away, with a recycling rate of less than 10 per cent.

At the same time, the exploitation of coltan and cassiterite, valuable minerals that make possible the technology of our mobiles, computers and consoles, is at the heart of the conflicts that produce millions of victims and refugees in the Democratic Republic of Congo. Illegal mining exploits child labour and destroys the habitats of many species such as chimpanzees and gorillas, which are critically endangered by poaching and deforestation.

The campaign ‘La selva nos llama’ (The jungle is calling) proposes to extend the useful life of our mobiles, and at the same time offers citizens a simple and free way to contribute unused mobiles (working or not), which will help raise funds for projects to support the Jane Goodall Institute.

The Marbella sports club has managed to recycle more than 40 mobiles but wants to go further and, therefore, asks anyone who has an old or unused mobile phone to hand it in at the Carlos Cabezas pavilion in order to sponsor a second chimpanzee.