Conservation Careers Podcast

Do you enjoy getting out into the field, identifying plants, animals, insects and more? Would you like to be paid for doing this and spend your career surveying for protected species and habitats whilst implementing the law to identify and avoid harmful impacts on them? Then a career as an ecological consultant might be perfect for you. To explore this practical, well paid and highly trained area...

Do you yearn for adventure? Do you enjoy discovering hidden corners of the globe and enjoy spending time immersed in nature? Then you will love the British Exploring Society. It is an amazing organisation that takes young people to extraordinary destinations, both in terms of the places they visit and also in their own lives. To find out more we're talking to their CEO, Honor Wilson Fletcher MBE....

Jon Paul Rodríguez is an award-winning Venezuelan conservationist who wears many hats. As Co-Founder of local NGO Provita, he spearheaded work to nearly triple the number of Endangered Yellow-Shouldered Parrots in the wild, winning the Whitley Gold Award in 2019 in the process. More recently, he was elected as the first non-European or non-North American Chair of the IUCN Nature Species Survival C...

Daniel Quilter fell in love with Malaysia, its wildlife and people during a field trip while at University. He quickly returned and in many ways never looked back. Since 2005, has been setting up eco enterprises which are businesses which help people and the planet. During this podcast we talk about Fuze Ecoteer, a Malaysian-based experience provider which connects people with wildlife. We talk ab...

Have you thought about starting a blog? Are you passionate about writing and communicating and want to share your thoughts, experiences and opinions? Will it make a difference? Kate Stephenson did this just nine years ago when she started her blog, Kate on Conservation. Now her award-winning blog highlights important conservation issues, individuals and organisations and tries to give the voice to...

How do you grow a conservation organisation from 5 staff to over 500 in just over two decades? Why might Greta Thunberg be wrong to avoid air travel, and how is the conservation industry changing the way it hires staff in the 21st century?   I discuss these issues and many more with today’s guest Mark Rose - Chief Executive Officer - Fauna & Flora International (FFI).  Mark is a powerhouse in cons...

Don't let anyone talk you away from your dreams says conservation biologist and today's guest Dr. Fernando Mateos González. In his free time Fernando ('Nando') runs Bioblogia.net where he helps students and early career professionals find their dream environmental role. Whether it's sharing job offers internships, volunteer opportunities and more Nando loves helping up and coming biologists. In hi...

Would you love to work in marine conservation but you don't know where to start? Are you struggling to find work or do you dream of switching your career into Blue Planet conservation? During this podcast we're speaking to Emily Daniels from WiseOceans. Emily has always had a sense of adventure and this led her to traveling to Australia at the age of 18, where she began her career in marine conser...

Have you ever wondered what it's like to switch careers into conservation, maybe moving from banking, marketing or law and supply your trade in an effort to save nature? Well, that's what today's guest has done. Nick Bubb is the Business Development Director at Fauna & Flora International (FFI) and prior to FFI, he spent nearly 10 years in professional ocean racing, covering 100,000 sea miles befo...

Today we're talking to someone whose drive, passion and achievements in a short space of time have just blown me away. Francesca Trotman is the Managing Director and Founder of ‘Love the Oceans’, an organisation seeking to create a marine protected area off the coast of Mozambique. Fran first visited the area whilst at university and saw firsthand sharks having their fins removed, to be used in th...

Are you interested in switching careers into conservation? Or perhaps you completed some studies and you wish you'd done something more conservationy instead? So how do you transition across and how do you reskill? Today we're talking to Dr Ada Grabowska-Zhang, from the University of Oxford. Ada is the Course Director for the Postgraduate Certificate in Ecological Survey Techniques, which is a one...

This week we're talking to Victoria Price from Vision Wild, a new organisation which designs, implements and evaluates wildlife conservation projects. In the podcast we discuss how to create a successful project and share tips for how to fundraise for conservation projects. We also explore the importance of project management skills for career development. If you want to build successful projects...

Today we’re turning the tables slightly and talking about, well us; Conservation Careers. We thought it would be a good end to the year and to the decade to look back at the journey of Conservation Careers over the past six years and also to look forwards to where we might be going next. Leading the discussion is our Head of Engagement Kristi Foster and we’re exploring things like how to get a con...

Oana wildlife reserve in the deep south of Namibia is 45,000 hectares of breath-taking mountainous semi-desert. Home to a previously unknown population of leopards, the reserve encompasses 50km of the lush Orange River, which is a wildlife refuge amid the extensive hues of orange and red rocky and sandy plains. For the past three and a half years, Andrea Pawel and her partner Ed have been working...

When you think about the Amazon basin and the vast area of dense jungle and vegetation, do you think about seeing dolphins? Me neither. Today we’re talking to Suzanne Smith, the Executive Director and Founder of the Amazon River Dolphin Conservation Foundation. This is a charity set up in 2014 to conserve the species through research, education and collaboration efforts. Suzanne has worked with ma...

Hi guys – Nick here from Conservation Careers This is just a special little broadcast to let you know that we’re supporting the Travel Blogger of the Year competition - run by Terra Incognita Travel - and entries are now open! If you enjoy writing or blogging all you need to do is submit a story about your favourite place on Earth in 800 words or fewer! Where is your favourite place on Earth? Mayb...

Have you ever dreamt about a career exploring the coral reefs of the south Pacific, diving in Fiji, Vanuatu, the Solomon Islands and all the lost corners of Papua New Guinea? Perhaps you’d love to spend time with the local communities whose lives depend on the health of their forests and fisheries, working in partnership with them in the longer term to find win-wins for people and wildlife. Well t...

On average every five minutes an albatross dies accidentally behind a fishing boat. Caught on a hook set for a fish, entangled in a net or striking a tensioned wire. During this episode a number of albatrosses will die needlessly. Dr Ben Sullivan has dedicated his career to tackling similar marine conservation issues. Starting with a PhD counting koala poo in the Australian Outback, Ben developed...

Competition for conservation jobs can be tough. The good news is that there are more jobs available than ever before. We list over 8,000 conservation jobs on our site each year and that continues to grow. The bad news is there are more people like you looking to work in the sector. So how do you stand out from the crowd and get an interview? We check application forms, CVs, cover letters and resum...

Rhett Butler is the founder and CEO of Mongabay, one of the largest, longest running and most important environmental news sites online.  Rhett started the site just 20 years ago when an area of rainforest he had visited and enjoyed in Borneo was cut down just eight weeks later, logged down for woodchips to supply a paper pulp plant.  He spent the first ten years of the project operating Mongabay...

With over 800 species of birds in South Africa and over 100 of them threatened, where do you start with trying to conserve them? Growing up in South Africa, Mark Anderson was taken out into the bush for days on end by his grandfather and then from an early age he knew that he wanted to be a conservationist. He studied hard and now works even harder as CEO of BirdLife South Africa. Today on the pod...

There are many times in our lives when we might find ourselves at a crossroads looking for purpose and direction. At these times, we might feel stuck and confused and perhaps we don’t know what to do. And if we do have a sense of what we need to do, we might find ourselves lacking the courage to make it happen. In short, we’re heading down the wrong path.  If this is you, then you’re not alone. To...

Have you ever considered doing a master's course (degree) to kick-start your career in conservation? What would completing a master's course achieve? Is it right for you and would it lead to a conservation job? These are some of the topics covered in a wide-ranging discussion with Brendan Godley, Professor of Conservation Science at the University of Exeter. Brendan is probably best known for his...

Professor Ken Norris is the Director of Science at the Zoological Society of London (ZSL). Ken leads ZSL's Institute of Zoology, which is the world’s only university in a zoo and he also oversees the vet teams who look after the welfare of animals at London and Whipsnade zoos. We talk about his exciting career in conservation science and he shares his advice for someone looking to secure a PhD as...

When the opening line of a story mentions an Aldi bag-for-life full of human poo, you know it’s gonna be worth reading on, right? That story was the winning entry in the Wildlife Blogger of the Year competition and written by Gianluca Cerullo. He’s a conservation scientist and writer with a passion for adventure, wildlife and wild places. Gianluca has been involved in expeditions and research arou...