Africa Connect

The team arrived with COSTECH clearance already in hand — which is the part most groups get wrong — but no ground plan beyond a hire car booking.

We supplied two field vehicles with drivers who knew the park's road network in the wet, four research assistants recruited locally and trained on the deployment protocol, and remote camp logistics for a team of nine including fuel, water and food resupply every five days.

The part that mattered most turned out to be the least glamorous: we handled the district-level relationships so the team could work in village land adjoining the park without the delays that usually consume the first fortnight.

Filming in Tanzania requires a Tanzania Film Board permit, and filming inside a national park requires a separate TANAPA permit priced by crew size and duration. Both take weeks. The production came to us eleven weeks out, which was just enough.

We scouted and photographed twelve locations before they committed to any, which saved two of their planned shoot days. We supplied fixers, drivers, a translator and local crew, handled community consent and appearance releases where they were filming people, and got their equipment carnet through customs without a delay.

The first cohort took nine months to plan properly. Since then it has run annually with the same structure and progressively less work each year.

We provide full ground logistics for the group: transport, accommodation, local instructors, translators, homestay placements in two villages, and a 24-hour emergency contact for the duration. We also produce the risk assessment documentation their institution requires, in the format the institution requires, which is a surprisingly large part of the job.

They had funding and a programme design. What they did not have was six months of learning how procurement, district approvals and local contracting actually work here — which is what most organisations lose their first phase to.

We handled vehicle logistics, recruited and vetted local field staff, made the district-level introductions, and sourced materials locally at local prices rather than through the intermediaries that inflate costs on projects like this.

This is the placement type we actively look for and rarely find: someone with a real skill, available long enough to matter, in a subject where the shortage is acute.

We placed her in a secondary school outside Moshi that had been without a maths teacher for a term. She taught four classes, and in the last month trained two existing staff on the syllabus so the capacity remained after she left.

Accommodation was with a vetted host family, with a local coordinator checking in weekly and a written report for her funder.

They wanted introductions. What they needed first was due diligence, because two of the four companies on their shortlist did not have the capacity they claimed.

We visited all four sites, photographed the facilities, checked BRELA registration and TRA standing, and reported honestly. We then arranged meetings with the two that were real, provided translation and a cultural briefing, and sat in.