Collaborating for Better Conservation - Lion Landscapes and The Ruaha Carnivore Project Merge

Lion Landscapes and the Ruaha Carnivore Project have joined forces in an effort to build more collaborative conservation, scaling up efforts to stop the loss of wildlife, reduce the cost of living with large carnivores and unlock the value of wildlife to local people. We have merged to form a new, combined organisation including all our existing programmes, under the name Lion Landscapes. The organisation, which will work in key landscapes across Tanzania, Kenya and Zambia, will be jointly led by Dr Alayne Cotterill and Dr Amy Dickman, who have championed collaborative conservation for years and are two of the six co-founders of the Pride Lion Conservation Alliance.

Moving forwards together as Lion Landscapes. Photo by Solomon Opodo

Lions are our flagship species, but our conservation work focuses on so much more than lions. We aim to help secure flourishing Lion Landscapes, which can support top predators, because they have a healthy habitat, thriving biodiversity (including prey) and people willing to tolerate large carnivores.

Healthy ‘lion landscapes’ are also vital for many other species.

Why merge?

Over the past year, Lion Landscapes and the Ruaha Carnivore Project have been collaborating and working together ever more closely to standardise and scale up our approaches across sites. The more we collaborated, the more we realised there was a huge opportunity for us to combine forces, become more efficient and increase our conservation impact.

There really is no time to waste: lions and many other species are declining very quickly, while conservation often fails to truly benefit or empower local people. We are excited to bring together all our combined expertise, knowledge and partnerships, to help build a better future of more effective, equitable conservation.

School feeding in Malinzanga. Unlocking the value of living alongside large carnivores by directly tying their presence to community benefits is a key pillar of our approach.

This work takes the skills, knowledge and passion of many team members in all our sites - please do learn more about them here. It would also not be possible without all our donors, supporters and friends around the world. Thank you all for your continued support, and we are thrilled to have you with us as we enter this exciting new phase. Please keep following us to hear more about our plans together, and learn more about the work of the new Lion Landscapes.

To learn more, watch the interview with the new Lion Landscapes Co-Founders and CEOs below!