Mission Africa (TV series)

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Mission Africa is a UK prime time television series produced by Diverse Bristol For BBC One and BBC Worldwide. This 12 part series follows the adventures of 15 trainees from the building trade, selected from hundreds of applicants across the UK, as they take on this impossible mission.

Traveling deep into the hostile frontier lands of Northern Kenya, with their expedition leader Ken Hames (Beyond Boundaries) and new foreman Nick Knowles (DIY SOS) the team find themselves in the primitive Sera Conservancy, marooned by a dry river bed with no water, and to make matters worse a bull elephant to keep them company.

Working side by side with local people the trainees had just six weeks to build an eco lodge, dig boreholes for water and help the local wildlife experts repopulate the area with animals. The team of rookie builders, electricians, plumbers and architects had no experience of surviving and working in the African bush. They had to get the build completed while satisfying the needs of the local Samburu tribal leaders who need water for their domestic stock, as well as the wildlife they have been pledged to protect.

Nick Knowles and former Special Forces Major Ken Hames put together the team, and are in charge of turning the volunteers into a united workforce. Ken, an expert on the African Frontier also trained the team as wildlife rangers.

Nick, Ken and the trainees lived in tents in the bush alongside the African team mates who were working with them on the site. At night the camp was protected by rangers which was visited at night by elephants and lions.

As the series progresses the ranger trainees captured six giraffe to relocate to the new reserve, tracked rhino and tagged elephant. Their training took place at Lewa, a conservancy further south and the template for the initiative at Sera, a new community conservation area in the far north of Kenya towards the Ethiopian and Somali borders. Sera is an area that for many years has been ravaged by tribal conflict, bandits and poaching and where conservancy experts are trying to bring security, stability and prosperity to the people.

The aim of the project was to enhance the work done by conservancies to conserve wildlife and its habitat with the support of local communities. This is done through the protection and management of species, the initiation and support of community conservation and development programmes, and the education of neighbouring areas in the value of wildlife.

With wildlife encouraged back to Sera visitors, tourists and investors will come with a chance to stay at the new lodge and view the wildlife close up. It will also provide better access to water for the local community as well as work and income.