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Dr Théophile Zognou

Théophile Zognou holds a PhD in international environmental law from the University of Limoges, France. Lecturer at various universities, Dr. Zognou is the Executive Director of the Sangha Tri-National Trust Fund (FTNS) which has an endowment capital of 65 million euros, positively impacting the TNS region that covers the Central African Republic, Cameroon and the Democratic Republic of Congo. He is the author of the book entitled “The Protection of the Marine and Coastal Environment in the Gulf of Guinea Region” and several legal articles in the field of the environment. Dr. Zognou was once a banker for about 8 years before joining the environmental field.

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Ms. Karen Price

Karen has had a lifelong passion for environmental issues and her 20-year career has been shaped by the Malawi Environmental Endowment Trust (MEET), where she currently works as the National Coordinator. MEET was one of the first Conservation Trust Funds (CTF) to be established in Malawi as an independent grant making institution that provides sustainable financing for biodiversity and natural resource management initiatives. Karen is responsible for providing strategic leadership to drive overall institutional strategy and operations to ensure that funds are mobilized, managed and disbursed to projects that yield positive conservation in accordance with national policies and plans specifically in the areas of landscape restoration, wetlands and waste management. She was instrumental in developing and implementing the guiding grant policy which has benefitted just over 250 environmental projects (in energy, environmental education, landscape restoration, waste management, human/wildlife conflict, wetlands, climate change) with community based organisations, local non-governmental organisations, academia and government.

Karen Price holds a Bachelor of Social Science (Honours) degree in Environmental Management, from the University of Cape Town, South Africa and a Master of Science (MSc.) in Environment and Development from the University of Edinburgh, Scotland. In terms of regional or continental experience, she was President of the Consortium of African Funds for the Environment (CAFÉ) from 2017 to 2022. CAFÉ is a network of nineteen CTF’s on the continent that strives to build the capacity of CTF’s by sharing of experiencing whilst pursuing innovative financing mechanisms that support conservation.

She has also served and continues to serve on various boards. She is the outgoing Chairperson of BASEflow Malawi, an organization that seeks to improve the sustainability of groundwater sources in Malawi; she’s Chairperson of the Board of Directors for the Centre for Environmental Policy (CEPA), an organisation that conducts research and advocacy on environmental and natural resource management policy and legislation; a Board member of the Coordination Union for the Rehabilitation of the Environment (CURE) an organization that works to provide technical support and improve networking amongst non-governmental organizations, the Government of Malawi, donors and other organizations or individuals working in the area of the environment; and a board member of the Atomic Energy Regulatory Authority (AERA). She is also a member of the Eastern and Southern Africa (ESARO) Regional Committee of International Union for the Conservation of Nature (IUCN).

Karen hopes to inspire the next generation and to expand her role and contributions to the sector and the region by exploring innovative financing and alternative approaches that enable greater participation and contributions towards the development of innovative environmental management solutions based in social enterprise and communities of practice.

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TAPIWA MAKIWA

Tapiwa Makiwa is the CEO of the Community Conservation Fund of Namibia (CCFN) a CTF charged with the mandate to ensure sustainable funding to Namibia’s Community Based Natural Resource Management (CBNRM) Programme. A lover of nature, Tapiwa is a Chartered Accountant (CA) by qualification, affiliated with the Institute of Chartered Accountants of Namibia (ICAN). In addition to this professional qualification/accreditation, he also holds amongst others an Honours Degree in the Theory of Accounting and a Bachelor’s Degree in Accounting Sciences from the University of South Africa (UNISA). Having completed his accounting articles with KMPG Chartered Accountants and Auditors he has worked in the audit, mining, and hospitality, retail, and manufacturing sectors of business. Immediately before his current role as Chief Executive Officer of the Community Conservation Fund of Namibia, he served as Chief Finance and Business Development Officer for a Namibian group of companies with interests in retail, hospitality, catering, and manufacturing. He has +/-17 years of progressive work experience in the financial field (audit, tax, accounting) and business and strategic management experience in the exploration, retail, hospitality, and tourism sectors with both international and local companies. Tapiwa carries with him a wealth of governance, business, and financial skills and together with his passion for people and wildlife has the balance required for operational and financial oversight of a CTF. He currently serves as the Vice-President of the Consortium of African Funds for the Environment, helping derive the objectives of the consortium forward.

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DR FANNY N’GOLO

Name : Dr Fanny N’golo

Position : Executive Director

Organisation : Foundation for Parks and Reserves of Côte d’Ivoire (FPRCI)

Veterinarian, Ecologist

More than twenty-five years of experience in natural resource management and biodiversity conservation / management of development projects

  • Establishment of a sustainable financing mechanism for national parks
  • Evaluation of the management effectiveness of protected areas
  • Management of wildlife and protected areas
  • Environmental education
  • Monitoring and evaluation of development projects
  • Monitoring of environmental impact studies
  • Coordination of participatory natural resource management projects
  • Planning and management of development projects
  • Strategic communication of development projects
  • Reform of protected area management systems
  • Mobilization of financing

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Guillaume de Rouville

Executive Director of the Okapi Fund for Nature Conservation in the DRC since June 2019, Guillaume is a former business lawyer who worked in the finance sector until 2000, then in biodiversity since 2001, first with the United Nations Environment Program (UNEP), then with the NGO Pro-Natura International in Brazil. He also has extensive experience in micro-finance and in the start-up sector, for which he raised funds when running an incubator he set up with associates passionate about innovation issues, particularly in the field of clean energy.

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