What is Panthera…and who are the principals behind it?
Panthera is a charity founded in 2006. With offices in New York and London, it was conceived as a unique vehicle: an integrated approach to the broad spectrum of challenges facing big cat conservation, from ensuring a pipeline of future scientists to species survival to recognition of high achievers in the field. The three founding directors were Thomas S. Kaplan, who serves as Executive Chairman; Alan Rabinowitz, who is now Panthera’s President and CEO; and Michael Cline, who serves as both a Director of Panthera as well as Chairman of Tigers Forever, our flagship project for the species. Luke Hunter, formerly Director of the Great Cats Program at WCS, acts as Panthera’s Executive Director. George Schaller serves as both Panthera’s Vice President and Chairman of its Cat Advisory Council, which encompasses the broadest assembly of the collective wisdom and experience in felid conservation. Andrea Heydlauff, our Managing Director, runs the operations of our head office in New York and Jessica Craig, our representative in England, acts as our liaison for project submittals and program development. She is joined on the board of Panthera's UK affiliate by Ali Reza Erfan, who also assists in our strategic international outreach. In addition, Panthera’s home offices are being complemented by a developing staff structure comprising some of the field’s most seasoned and accomplished professionals, including Tom McCarthy and Howard Quigley, who have joined with us to oversee our global activities and are respectively two of the leading authorities on snow leopards and the Americas’ cats.
Isn’t focusing on wild cats a narrow viewpoint in terms of the broader challenges facing wildlife conservation?
No…to the contrary. At its core, any prospect of saving the big cats is predicated on preserving and protecting two key ingredients: land and prey. Bearing in mind the wide ranges of these apex predators, and their need for readily available protein, saving wild cat species is an intelligent way to save the habitats and eco-systems that are most at risk today. Being very often the sexy, charismatic megafauna in any given hotspot, the concept may be distilled to a simple phrase: saving the big cats is the most easily marketable way to save everything else in its territory. As such, Panthera’s agenda of saving the big cats throughout their natural range is a gambit not merely to indulge a love for these iconic species…but to preserve a meaningful portion of the world’s natural endowment.
How is Panthera different from other non-governmental organizations (NGOs)?
Panthera is not simply a funding organization but a pro-active cat conservation think tank that supports the best people, the best programs, and the best ideas in order to continually raise the bar and enhance the effectiveness of current cat conservation activities. Our focus is to channel all our energy and resources into the field where the need is most urgent; as such, Panthera strives to keep staffing and bureaucracy to a minimum. With a core group numbering fewer than a dozen, Panthera is extremely lean in personnel…yet in our first year of existence we have already devoted more resources than any other NGO to cat conservation. Additionally, unlike most other NGOs, Panthera guarantees core operating and salary costs across the organization, so that there is never any overhead taken from donations: in other words, 100% of donations made to Panthera goes to the field.
The Background to Panthera
What inspired you to found Panthera?
I have always felt a tremendous affinity for the big cats. At the tender age of seven, in the days before George Schaller, Alan Rabinowitz and others redefined the nature of big cat literature, I was presented with Jim Corbett’s The Maneaters of Kumaon…and, for good measure, The Maneating Leopard of Rudraprayag when I turned eight. As a boy, my room was plastered with paintings and posters of big cats, and visitors to our home would have to make a donation at the door for the World Wildlife Fund’s Project Tiger. At ten, I was already tracking bobcats in Florida. It was on such an adventure that I had the rare privilege of encountering a Florida Panther…whose pugmark was memorialized with a plaster cast. By eleven, I was in Colombia looking for jaguars…under the watchful eyes of my mother.
Big cat conservation was clearly my passion and I entertained the prospect of becoming a felid zoologist. In time, the fascination for zoology gave way to a stronger gift for history, which I indulged at Oxford, and tremendous luck in my business, exploring for untapped minerals and energy. If my avocation has been history, and my vocation natural resources...conservation has remained my first love. It is my privilege that I can apply the lessons I have learned in other fields, and indeed the important contacts that my professional life affords me, to drive a highly aggressive environmental agenda. The opportunity to fund and reward those who have given their lives to the pursuit of preserving the big cats and, equally importantly, the habitats and eco-systems which sustain them, is the closing of a virtuous circle that began in my youth.
How did you come to know Alan Rabinowitz, and how did that lead to the creation of the Rabinowitz-Kaplan Prize?
When I first read Alan’s classic volume, Jaguar, I realized that this Jewish boy had done what I had wished to do as a youngster. I felt an immediate, indeed filial, affection for the man, and knowing connection to the depth of his passion. We’ve jokingly said we were 'separated at birth'. I resolved one day, when it was within my means, to help him accomplish his biggest ambitions in a way that he had, unknowingly, lived out so many of mine. In the great circle of life I felt I had prospered so that others would be able to excel at what we loved…and live our common dreams.
I have often said that Alan is the embodiment of all the virtues I hold dear in the conservation field...only magnified. To many an iconic figure in his profession for his multitude of achievements and extraordinary character, he certainly represents all that I would have aspired to be had I similar aptitudes. As I grew to know him more, I realized that one of my obvious missions in life was to fulfill his dreams in direct proportion to the way that his life reflected the one I would have led...were I a more talented and less acquisitive person. Collaborating with him has given life and context to a passion that could easily have been unrequited. With fraternal sincerity, it was my great honor that, after having been the first recipient of the Kaplan Prize, for the subsequent prizes he accepted linking our destinies in the Rabinowitz-Kaplan Prizes, which are presented for both Lifetime Achievement in wild cat conservation, as well as for a young scientist or individual whose accomplishments portend real potential for further achievement. The first recipients of both renamed prizes, George Schaller and Ivan Seryodkin respectively, represent brilliant examples of what and whom we seek to encourage in both categories.
Panthera and its challenges
What are Panthera’s criteria for approving projects?
At this stage, we are still young enough not to be hobbled by a stifling or bureaucratic culture…nor do we ever intend to be. To be sure, good science, combined with an achievable conservation component, lies at the root of our analysis because, at the end of the day, all sustainable undertakings require an intellectual rather than strictly emotional underpinning. We have turned down projects for a variety of reasons, and will continue to do so. But our most important metric for judging every project remains: how does it benefit wild cat populations on the ground? The overwhelming priority for Panthera is that the projects we support produce measurable conservation gains to cats in the wild. Naturally, everyone believes that their cause is the most exciting or urgent. The task of matching resources to objectives requires a discrimination that may be painful to proponents of any given project...not to mention ourselves. Having said that, the careful development of our professional staff, as well as the creation of genuine consultative bodies such as the Cat Advisory Council, are part of a process of encouraging the most rigorous adherence to best practices and transparency in our field.
Does Panthera feel conflicted by operating in countries which are criticized over human rights?
Not really. Attacking conservationists for trying to preserve the natural heritage of any people, no matter the form of government they find themselves living under, is an unfair charge. The idea that, by working to save tigers in Myanmar or lions in Zimbabwe, conservationists are responsible for conferring legitimacy on these governments is an absurdity. Would a doctor serving patients in these countries be criticized? As wildlife conservation today in many places is akin to triage, the answer is clear. Like all conservation groups, we try to adhere to a basic principle: to enfranchise the wildlife with more than a modicum of chance of survival in a hostile world. Until such time as tigers, lions or snow leopards are shown to have undermined human rights or elected governments, we'll focus more on saving them for future generations of their host countries than in playing politics.
Panthera and its Species Survival Programs
How was Tigers Forever established?
Tigers Forever represents the promise of an exciting new paradigm for saving the tiger. It is the brainchild of Michael Cline, a Panthera director. A seasoned venture capitalist and passionate big cat conservationist, Michael, in conjunction with Alan Rabinowitz and the world’s leading tiger specialists at the Wildlife Conservation Society, Ullas Karanth, Dale Miquelle and Colin Poole, devised a truly novel approach to superimposing a business model, with a results-oriented funding mechanism, onto conservation in a way that has the ability to transform conventional methods of measuring success in tiger conservation… and ultimately in conserving other species as well. Michael is the rare man who puts his money where his heart is…and in a substantial way. Having devised the concept, he and his wife made the first pledge of $5,000,000. My wife, Daphne, and I pledged to match those funds. The $10,000,000 already pledged to Tigers Forever makes it perhaps the most aggressive tiger conservation initiative ever.
How did the Jaguar Corridor come about?
Expanding on his work in creating the first jaguar reserve, the Cockscomb Basin Wildlife Sanctuary in Belize, Alan Rabinowitz devised a plan to create a 'corridor' connecting jaguar populations throughout a range extending from Mexico to northern Argentina that would allow for both genetic transference and habitat continuity. The Panthera project is a joint-venture with its co-funder, the U.S. Department of State. An offshoot of the Jaguar Corridor is Panthera’s Strategic Lands Initiative, which aims to assist in the public and private acquisition of critical habitats that will be managed for long-term jaguar conservation within the context of traditional land usage, such as cattle ranching, as well as new enterprises including eco-tourism. To date, 170,000 acres of such habitat has been taken off the market with more land under negotiation.
What is Project Leonardo?
Building on the successful adoption of the corridor model, Panthera’s team created Project Leonardo, an ambitious program developed by Luke Hunter to preserve the African lion across the entirety of its range. Despite its apparently ubiquitous profile, the lion is likely to be classified as endangered in the short to medium term as habitat destruction and human persecution ravage lion populations and their ranges, which are already down more than 80% in the last 250 years. Cognizant of the perils of waiting till the very last hour to act, as was done with the tiger, Project Leonardo's aim is to forestall the precipitous decline in status of the African lion by creating viable connections between lion populations throughout Africa similar to the offence-oriented philosophy underpinning Panthera’s jaguar efforts in the Americas.
What are the aims of the Snow Leopard Initiative? Are other Species Survival Programs in the works?
In 2007, as a consequence of a fortuitous engagement with the Government of Pakistan, Panthera moved to convene a conference of all the dozen range states that host wild snow leopard populations. The aim was to hold the first assembly of stakeholders for the purpose of not only comparing on-the-ground research but to develop a comprehensive and long-term action plan for the species’ survival in which Panthera would take the lead funding role. In March 2008, Panthera sponsored in Beijing, with the Snow Leopard Trust, WCS and the Snow Leopard Network, the International Conference on Range-Wide Conservation Planning for Snow Leopards. A success on many levels, we look forward to participating in its implementation. The addition of Tom McCarthy to Panthera’s team underscores our commitment to be leading this coalition and the fundraising that will accompany this international effort.
In addition to the aforementioned programs, we are planning a new initiative for cheetahs that will complete, for the present, the foundational work for our series of Species Survival Programs. Emulating the approach being utilized with Project Leonardo, a series of comprehensive cheetah workshops are being held under the auspices of WCS and other partners with a view to creating an action plan for the rangewide preservation of the species.
Panthera and the Next Generation
What are the Kaplan Scholarships and what are these grants meant to accomplish?
To ensure that there is a next generation of felid zoologists, and that there is thus a healthy 'pipeline' of credentialed big cat conservationists for the future, my family has established a scholarship program which provides funding for postgraduate candidates who are undertaking field work in felid conservation. Overseen by Luke Hunter and Alan Rabinowitz, with the assistance of Nicole Williams and Jessica Craig, this program has gained consideration traction and critical mass in a way that gives us encouragement that we can meet this challenge. Starting with one scholarship in the Spring of 2005, the number of recipients researching species varying in size from Pallas cats and jaguarundis to snow leopards and tigers has mushroomed to over 37 across the globe, and continues to grow as word has spread about this unique initiative.
Are there other steps being taken to bring new conservationists on board?
Having begun to redress a key need to incubate and create seasoned biologists, we are now working with educational institutions to address another potential bottleneck for wild cat conservation: the scarcity of trained entry-level and mid-level field staff in the developing world, and the need to develop more indigenous opportunities for incipient environmentalists. This we plan to redress through regional training hubs based in several key countries as well as our groundbreaking alliance with Oxford University.
What is your attitude to teaming up with new players in the field?
Panthera’s philosophy is not about competing with any groups, but to seek out and forge the optimal alliances to accomplish our common aims. We have numerous ventures with several different organizations. While not promiscuous, neither are we exclusive. Panthera is always looking for, and receptive to, new opportunities for partnerships and strategic relationships. Deliberately dubbing ourselves ‘Partners in Wild Cat Conservation’, Panthera is designed to be collaborative, building bridges with any and all organizations that have programs that meet our objectives.
What is the Panthera-WildCRU alliance?
The partnership which has been established between Panthera and Oxford University, with whom I have had longstanding ties, is extremely exciting. Beginning with our sponsorship of the Felid Biology and Conservation Conference at Oxford in September 2007 and its subsequent workshops, the relationship has developed into a broad collaboration with the University, including a groundbreaking suite of fellowships and scholarships at Pembroke College, a research visitors program at Lady Margaret Hall, and a new fully-funded Oxford- accredited diploma course available to the best graduates from developing countries to study practical felid conservation techniques. The alliance also includes funding for Panthera projects that are being led by the University’s Wildlife Conservation Research Unit. As a consequence of these various efforts, Panthera, in partnership with our colleague Dr. David MacDonald and WildCRU, has now rendered Oxford the foremost academic institution with an established focus on felid conservation. It is our intention that the unique platform rendered by this alliance will be broadened to encompass strategic linkages with other academic institutions around the globe in both research and conservation projects, as well as transferring knowledge of best practices in the training required for the various disciplines of felid conservation.
Getting Involved
How can people help in their own way?
Since its inception in mid-2006, Panthera has emerged as one of the most focused and dynamic new forces in cat conservation. As with collaborations that are being created with governments and institutions all over the world, Panthera welcomes relationships with individuals, corporations and foundations that wish to be involved with its ambitious agenda. With Tigers Forever, Project Leonardo, the Jaguar Corridor and the Snow Leopard Initiative showing the way forward in both catalyzing and accelerating some of the most ambitious projects in our arena, we are more than capable of providing a philanthropic outlet for like-minded people who have a desire to support our broad vision… or even specific cat species. Always keen to leverage our capital through matching (or "challenge") grants, we are very open to providing opportunities for those who are motivated to sponsor and name new and existing programs, to acquire land in critical habitats for long-term conservation, or to offer assistance in any way they can to promote or advance the protection of the world’s wild cats.
