Julia Riedel

I am a biologist with special interest in primatology and conservation. Professor Christophe Boesch at the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology is my P.h.D. supervisor and I am working at the Wild Chimpanzee Foundation (WCF) Head Office in Leipzig. The WCF goal is to enhance the survival of the remaining critically endangered chimpanzee populations and their habitat, thereby participate in saving the behavioural diversity of this fascinating species. The philosophy of the WCF is threefold: Implement projects of Education, Conservation, and Research for and by the African people. The WCF's main achievements are the survival of the Taï National Park in Côte d’Ivoire (UNESCO world heritage site, 435 000 hectares of primary tropical forest) and the 500 chimpanzees living there. We are spearheading the creation of new protected areas in high biodiversity hotspots such as the new Grebo-Krahn National Park (106 000 hectares, over 200 chimpanzees) in Liberia and the new Moyen-Bafing National Park (800 000 hectares, over 5500 chimpanzees) in Guinea. In 2011, I received the the Yves Rocher Foundation - "Trophée de femmes" award in Germany 2011 for WCF's environmental education project "Club P.A.N." which I developed. In 2015, Christophe Boesch and the WCF received the "St Andrews Prize for the Environment" for the important project of the Proposed Moyen-Bafing National Park in Guinea, its creation and its unique chimpanzee population - the largest in West Africa!