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Oxford University’s WildCRU, Panthera join forces for Africa’s lions; appoint joint programme director

There are only 24,000 lions today in Africa and 674 in India’s Gir forest




By Rajat Ghai
Published: Thursday 18 May 2023

Oxford University’s WildCRU, Panthera join forces for Africa’s lions; appoint joint programme director


Panthera, the global wild cat conservation organisation, has appointed Andrew Loveridge as Lion Program Director, a joint role with Oxford University’s Wildlife Conservation Research Unit (WildCRU), in what it described as a ‘turning point for lion conservation’ on May 17, 2023.

WildCRU is a research unit within Oxford University’s Department of Biology — with a focus on wild carnivore research and threat mitigation – and the host of a distinguished early-career conservation training programme, a statement by Panthera said.

“Under Dr Loveridge’s leadership, Panthera and WildCRU seek to develop programmes which help reverse lion declines in sites with recovery potential; maintain populations’ genetic diversity; and protect and connect priority populations via comprehensive threat mitigation,” the statement added.



Efforts will include high-tech law enforcement and anti-poaching partnerships; community engagement; conservation education; behavioural change campaigns; lion and prey monitoring; and meaningful local incentives for conservation.

Together, both organisations have supported work in 12 countries, including landscapes which cover 67 per cent of lion range and around 70 per cent of Africa’s remaining 24,000 lions.

In recent decades, wild lion populations in Africa have undergone catastrophic decreases due to poaching for the illegal wildlife trade, habitat loss and human-wildlife conflict.

The 24,000 lions that remain on the Continent today are a sharp contrast from the 100,000 that were estimated to roam Africa in the 1970s. That is a decline of 75 per cent in the last five decades.

The statement added that the joint lion programme will “build on recent successes that provide replicable models for recovering lion populations”.

For instance, it said lion populations are likely rebounding in Zambia’s Kafue National Park thanks to four years of rigorous counter-poaching operations.

Also, Panthera and Senegal’s Department of National Parks have helped Critically Endangered West African lions in Niokolo Koba National Park more than double since 2011

“Cooperation is the way to go. If institutions are coming together, it can only be a positive thing. Pooling thinking and action adds strength and resilience,” Ravi Chellam, chief executive of Bengaluru-based Metastring Foundation and noted expert on the Asiatic lion told Down To Earth.