Jonathan and Angela Scott of “Big Cat Diary” host Cheetah Conservation Fund’s Dr. Laurie Marker at the Royal Institute of Britain in Mayfair on February 11th

Jonathan and Angela Scott of “Big Cat Diary” host Cheetah Conservation Fund’s Dr. Laurie Marker at the Royal Institute of Britain in Mayfair on February 11th
PRESS RELEASE
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

CONTACT:
Alison Ravano, CCF UK Trustee, alisonravano@gmail.com
Liz Georges, Communications Coordinator, liz@cheetah.org

Jonathan and Angela Scott of “Big Cat Diary” host Cheetah Conservation Fund’s Dr. Laurie Marker at the Royal Institute of Britain in Mayfair on February 11th

January 16, 2014 (OTJIWARONGO, Namibia) – Noted wildlife photographers Jonathan and Angela Scott of Big Cat Diary fame, will be hosting “LIVING WITH CHEETAHS: HOW HUMANS AND WILDLIFE CAN FLOURISH TOGETHER,” featuring Dr. Laurie Marker, the Founder and Executive Director of the Cheetah Conservation Fund (CCF) and one of the world’s leading experts on cheetahs. Jonathan and Angela Scott will present an inside glimpse of their life living with cheetahs in Kenya’s Masai Mara, and Dr. Marker will speak about her lifelong efforts to save the cheetah from extinction.

The event will be held at the Royal Institute of Britain in Mayfair at 21 Albemarle Street, London, on 11 February 2014, starting at 7:30pm. Tickets are £25 per person and include a complimentary beverage. Those who wish may attend a special VIP reception at 6:00pm with Dr. Marker and Jonathan and Angela Scott with a special ticket purchase of £100. Proceeds from the event will go to benefit the Cheetah Conservation Fund. Sponsors for the event include Swarovski Optik and Aardvark Safaris. Tickets are available at http://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/living-with-cheetahs-how-humans-and-wildlife-can-flourish-together-tickets-9843353736.

The cheetah is not only the fastest animal on land, but also the most endangered of Africa’s big cats. Current estimates are that the world has lost over 90 percent of the world’s cheetah population in the last 100 years. Dr. Marker holds a PhD in zoology from Oxford University, and has been working in Namibia to save the cheetah from extinction for almost 25 years as the Founder and Executive Director of the Cheetah Conservation Fund.

“We’re delighted to be able to introduce Dr. Marker to our friends here in London,” says Jonathan Scott. “Angie and I have visited Laurie in Namibia on a number of occasions and have always been hugely impressed with her work – she’s developed real solutions to how people and wildlife can live together. Her work has the potential to not only save the cheetah, but help protect other predators that face human-wildlife conflict issues.”

CCF’s innovative and award-winning approach to conservation has helped stabilize the population of cheetahs in Namibia, and focuses not only on the cheetah, but on its entire ecosystem, including the human communities living alongside cheetahs. One of CCF’s highly acclaimed programmes is its successful livestock guarding dog programme, which breeds and places Turkish Anatolian shepherds and Kangal dogs with Namibian livestock farmers. The dogs protect small stock herds from predators, and thereby reduce the need for farmers to trap or shoot cheetahs. The dogs are highly effective. Farmers utilizing a CCF dog report their livestock losses reduced by 80 to 100 percent, and the dogs are so popular that there is now a two year waiting list to receive one. This past year, CCF helped place Kangals in a collaborative programme in Tanzania.

Cheetah Conservation Fund UK is the registered non-profit affiliate for the Cheetah Conservation Fund in the United Kingdom. For more information, please visit https://www.cheetah.org.uk.

Founded in Namibia 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 Namibian students. CCF is a registered non-profit in Namibia, the UK, Canada and the US. People can learn more about CCF or make a donation to the organisation by visiting www.cheetah.org.