Partners

The Zambian Department of National Parks and Wildlife (DNPW), under the Ministry of Tourism, is focused on protecting and conserving Zambia’s wildlife estates while enhancing the quality of life among communities and maintaining healthy biodiversity. African Parks commenced its work with the DNPW in Liuwa Plain National Park in 2003 and in the Bangweulu Wetlands in 2008. Mr Dominic L. Chiinda is the Director of Department of National Parks and Wildlife.

The Lottery has been raising funds since 1989 to support organisations working towards a fairer and greener world. At least 40% of every ticket sold goes to charity. The Lottery has steadily grown to become the biggest charity lottery in the Netherlands, supporting 146 non-governmental organisations. Since its founding, the Lottery has dispensed over €8 billion. Over the last five years, African Parks has received €4.5 million in unrestricted funding. Also, we were the recipient, together with World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF) and Peace Parks, of €16.9 million for a Dreamfund project in 2020 to boost the ecological and socio-economic development of the world’s largest terrestrial transfrontier conservation area, the Kavango Zambezi (KAZA), which helped us fund operations in developing Kafue National Park, Zambia.

A joint initiative of Save the Elephants and the Wildlife Conservation Network, the ECF is a flexible and responsive fund that supports the best efforts by the most trusted organisations globally, working to secure a future for elephants in Africa. Since 2015, the ECF has not only contributed more than US$5.9 million to African Parks, but also expertise on best practice in elephant conservation. This has benefitted critical surveillance, intelligence-based protection, and human-elephant conflict mitigation activities for some of our most threatened elephant populations.

The Foundation supports large and small change-oriented initiatives that are sympathetic to people, animals and nature. Its goal is to make heart-warming contributions that make a difference to the preservation of a liveable world for current and future generations. In 2023, Stichting Nieuwgeluk Philosophy supported core costs in Zakouma National Park, the rhino translocation to Zakouma National Park in December and community development in Kafue National Park.

Wildcat is a private philanthropic foundation, whose purpose is to help save, and provide for the long-term conservation of endangered wildlife and wild places in Africa. It supports innovative new approaches that disrupt traditional wildlife protection paradigms, focusing largely on comprehensive training modules, equipment, and technology for rangers. The foundation first partnered with African Parks in 2014 and has continued to demonstrate its commitment to conservation by investing in eight parks across seven countries. In 2023, Wildcat continued critical support for the development and implementation of conservation law enforcement strategies in Garamba in DRC, Pendjari and W in Benin, and Kafue National Park in Zambia.

INL advances security, stability, and the rule of law, prerequisites for sustainable economic development and protection of natural resources. Since 2017, INL has partnered with African Parks on critical conservation law enforcement support in protected areas, enhancing the professionalisation and effectiveness of rangers across Africa. While standardised operational capacity transcends all protected areas managed by African Parks, ten protected areas have received direct support in the Democratic Republic of Congo, Chad, the Republic of Congo, the Central Africa Republic, Benin, Malawi and Zambia. INL support has led to the development of leadership and core training infrastructure, enables air surveillance, improves the welfare of rangers and canines, enhances technology for communication, wildlife monitoring and information management and advances national and regional collaboration with other security and conservation partners. Evidence management training and support to judicial systems, have also contributed to notable increases in wildlife crime convictions. These interventions not only protect wildlife, but also contribute to increased security of neighbouring communities and regional stability.

The Foundation is a private charitable organisation dedicated to supporting innovative, lasting solutions that improve lives, empower communities and strengthen connections to the land. The Foundation’s relationship with African Parks began in 2015 with a grant to support the restoration of Akagera National Park, followed by a significant investment in Malawi’s Liwonde National Park and Nkhotakota Wildlife Reserve. In 2017, the Foundation made a ground-breaking commitment of US$65 million to provide ongoing support for Akagera and the Malawi parks, along with start-up funding for five new parks. This enabled the addition of Pendjari and W in Benin, Bazaruto Archipelago National Park in Mozambique, Iona National Park in Angola and Matusadona National Park in Zimbabwe. In 2021, the Foundation furthered its support of African Parks with another extraordinary commitment of US$108 million, which will provide for the continued support of current Wyss-funded parks, as well as start-up funding for another five new parks. Three new parks in the African Parks portfolio – Kafue National Park in Zambia, Badingilo and Boma National Parks in South Sudan – are benefitting from the Wyss Foundation’s latest commitment and two are benefiting from renewal commitments – Bazaruto and Pendjari.