ICCF Honours Dr. Laurie Marker of Cheetah Conservation Fund with the Prestigious “Good Steward” Award

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Contact: Liz Georges, Communications Coordinator, liz@cheetah.org

ICCF Honours Dr. Laurie Marker of Cheetah Conservation Fund with the Prestigious “Good Steward” Award

August 15, 2013 (ALEXANDRIA, Virginia) – Dr. Laurie Marker, Founder and Executive Director of the Cheetah Conservation Fund (CCF) and one of the leading experts on the cheetah, will be honoured by the International Conservation Caucus Foundation (ICCF) with their “Good Steward” Award on September 18, 2013, at ICCF’s 2013 U.S. Congressional International Conservation Gala at the Andrew Mellon Auditorium in Washington, DC.

ICCF’s “Good Steward” Award is presented annually to recognise outstanding individual leadership in conservation. Past recipients of ICCF awards include former U.K. Prime Minister Tony Blair, Prince Albert II of Monaco, Prime Minister of Norway Jens Stoltenberg, Ed Norton, and Harrison Ford, among others. Also being honoured alongside Dr. Marker will be the Honourable Ed Royce, Chairman of the U.S. House Committee on Foreign Affairs, who will be receiving the Teddy Roosevelt International Conservation Award, and the Coca Cola Company, which is being recognized with ICCF’s Conservation Leadership in Business Award.

“When I met Laurie Marker, she had just sold everything she owned and was headed to Namibia to make a last ditch effort to secure the one remaining viable population of wild cheetah on earth,” says David Barron, Founder of ICCF. “She had enough money to buy a broken down old Land Rover and live for 6 months. Today she manages an enormously successful network of partnerships in that country and throughout Africa and has established the Cheetah Conservation Fund as the prototypical model for on-the-ground conservation of threatened species and habitat around the world.”

Dr. Marker will be travelling from CCF’s headquarters in Namibia to attend the 2013 U.S. Congressional International Conservation Gala in Washington, DC and receive this award. “When an organisation like ICCF, that brings together such a diverse constituency, gives an award like this, it means a lot,” says Dr. Marker. “I’m honoured and very grateful.”

Founded in Namibia (Africa) in 1990, Cheetah Conservation Fund (CCF) is the global leader in research and conservation of cheetahs. CCF is dedicated to saving the cheetah in the wild. CCF’s Founder and Executive Director, Dr. Laurie Marker, an American biologist, is considered one of the world’s foremost experts on cheetah biology, ecology and conservation and has developed CCF’s conservation strategy, which has contributed to increasing the wild cheetah population in Namibia by ~50%.

CCF’s long-term studies analyse and monitor the factors affecting the cheetah’s survival in the wild, and results are used to develop conservation policies and education programmes that have reached over 300,000 people. CCF is a registered non-profit in Namibia, Canada, UK and the US, where it is listed as a “Four Star Charity” by Charity Navigator, which recognises sound fiscal management and commitment to accountability and transparency. People can learn more about CCF or make a donation to the organisation by visiting www.cheetah.org.

The International Conservation Caucus Foundation (ICCF) is a 501(c)(3) educational foundation promoting the projection of U.S. leadership for international conservation worldwide. For a decade, the mission of ICCF has been to serve as the nucleus for Congressional leadership for U.S. international conservation in concert with the projection of U.S. business and national security interests worldwide. ICCF underpins the leadership of the bipartisan U.S. Congressional International Caucus (ICC), which comprises more than a third of the U.S. Congress. It educates policy makers on international issues of natural resource management throughout the legislative process.