As a boy, Bart Weetjens used to breed rats and sell them to pet stores. Well, until he found out the pet stores sold them to reptile owners as food. Now Bart is back in business with his rats but this time he’s training them to sniff out land mines and tuberculosis. And there pretty good at it. At first people scoffed at the crazy rat lover’s idea, now his company Apopo, or as it is also known, Herorats, is making waves in scientific research and humanitarian work.
At present, more than 100 million landmines have been deployed in more than 90 countries and they kill or maim 40 to 55 people per day on average, according to an estimate by the International Committee of the Red Cross. Combatants continue to lay 40,000 new mines each year and it is thought that at present rates, it will take 500 years to remove them all.
As Bart explained in a presentation to the non-profit Samasource, yesterday, “Land mines form a structural barrier to development”. As long as there is the possibility of land mines in areas, no business or even the nearby population will risk developing the hazardous land. In fact, in one town in Tanzania the barrier for development was such that the entire town effectively relocated. The town of 25,000 people dwindled substantially due to just 4 mines that were located around the town’s well.
So where do the rats come in? Clearing the minefields is a huge burden to developing countries, they simply cannot afford to do it themselves. As such, humanitarian organisations are involved in most of the de-mining. However, nearly all mine clearers come from the foreign organisations and must be heavily trained. A trained de-miner can scour about a 100m squared area of land in a day, with the use of metal detectors and sometimes dogs. The Herorats can cover the same area in just 30 minutes. And they also provide a sustainable channel of employment for the local population. The rats can be fairly easily trained for the job by people who, themselves, have received simple training. This leads to local run de-mining. While foreign help is obviously still a benefit – the mines are removed – the local community does not benefit from the economic potential of employment in this area.
Why rats?
Animals can be trained to sniff out mines, thus equaling the effect of a metal detector. However, animals have a greater speed of scouring. Further, animals can detect plastic covered mines where the metal detectors fail. Ok, so animals are good, but why not dogs then? Firstly, dogs can cost up to $40,000 to buy and train and in addition the rats are so light that they face no risk in setting off the mines in this dangerous work.
So it seems Weetjens has struck a gold mine with his rats, and one that won’t explode. And as if the story could get any better, the Herorats also have their sights set on huge developments in scientific research. Right now the rats can detect Tuberculosis in saliva samples with an accuracy almost equal to trained professionals. A lab technician can test 40 samples in a day, Apopo’s rats: 2000. That’s the same 40 samples in just 7 minutes.
The rat loving, Buddhist monk from Belgium, Bart Weetjens is definitely on to something. You can adopt a rat and help his cause for just 5c a month.
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