Dr. Kirstin Johnson 2023 Speaker

UK Director

African Wildlife Foundation

Biography

Kirstin Johnson is an anthropologist, international development professional and conservationist with a particular interest in conservation in Kenya and the East Africa region. Her career began at the Wildlife Conservation Monitoring Centre in Cambridge, followed by anthropological studies in London and Oxford, including M.Sc. research on the interface between communities and wildlife in the Budongo Forest in Uganda, and later Ph.D. research in Kenya in the Tsavo region. She then moved into international development, where she worked for twenty years in a variety of advisory, programme development, management and funding roles for VSO and ActionAid UK. Between 2002 to 20218, Kirstin served on the board of Directors for the well-known Maasai-owned and run Il Ngwesi ecotourism programme in Kenya in a strategic and advisory capacity. Passionate about community rights and conservation, Kirstin joined AWF in 2017 and is leading the expansion of AWF in the UK as AWF’s UK Director, focusing on building a network of partners, supporting UK Government relations, and growing AWF’s profile and influence in the UK. Her focus is to support AWF’s new ten-year vision which prioritises African conservation leadership, conservation of Africa’s large natural landscapes, and the protection of Africa’s endangered species including from the illegal wildlife trade. She is particularly engaged in growing activity around private sector ‘investing in nature’ as a significant opportunity to tackle global biodiversity loss and climate change.