The Lookfar Podcast: Voices from the Wild

Dr. Iroro Tanshi and Dr. Benneth Obitte, co-founders and directors of the Small Mammal Conservation Organisation (SMACON), join Marlies Quirino and Lucia Guaita on The Lookfar Podcast: Voices from the Wild. Iroro and Benneth are notable for their contributions to bats conservation and ecological research in Nigeria. Their interdisciplinary approach combines ecological research, conservation effort...

Wain Collen, co-founder and executive director of Fundación Aliados in Ecuador, joins Scott Stone, Marlies Quirino, and Lucia Guaita on  The Lookfar Podcast: Voices from the Wild . Aliados’s work is centered on four pillars – practicing regenerative agriculture, incubating bioeconomy initiatives, connecting to responsible markets, and creating new ecological value. Aliados just launched the Center...

Sara Lara and Isabella Cortes join us on the Lookfar Podcast to talk about how they are striving to break down barriers at grassroots levels in Colombia preventing rural and indigenous women from becoming conservationists through their work with ⁠⁠Women for Conservation⁠⁠⁠ (W4C), founded by Sara and now run by her daughter Isabella, and ⁠Fundación ProAves⁠⁠ , now run by Sara. In a wide ranging con...

We talk with Daniel Aristizabal of the Amazon Conservation Team (ACT) about his work protecting isolated indigenous peoples in Colombia. These are indigenous communities that, sometimes centuries ago, decided to withdraw and avoid contact with the outside world, which Daniel describes both as a defense strategy and an act of rebellion. Protecting the rights of indigenous peoples is never easy, and...

The intrepid team at the Gouritz Cluster Biosphere Reserve (GCBR ) in the Western Cape in South Africa joins Marlies Quirino and Scott Stone of Lookfar Conservation for an in-person discussion about community-level conservation work done at a landscape scale. The 3.2 million hectares of the GCBR, declared a UNESCO Biosphere Reserve in 2015, is a living laboratory for complex conservation and resto...

Luís Paulo Ferraz and Carlos Ruiz of the Associação Mico-Leāo-Dourado (AMLD) join Marlies Quirino and Scott Stone of Lookfar Conservation to talk about protecting and restoring the habitat of the endangered Golden Lion Tamarin – a small monkey found only in surviving fragments of the Atlantic Forest of Brazil. Luís Paulo and Carlos talk about how AMLD’s work is driven by local communities, sparkin...

Nicholas and Raquel Locke of the Reserva Ecológica de Guapiaçu (REGUA), located in the Atlantic Forest of Brazil, join us on the Lookfar Podcast for an in-person discussion with Scott Stone and Marlies Quirino of Lookfar Conservation. We talk about REGUA’s efforts to connect and protect the highly biodiverse forests of the Guapiaçu Valley, just a few hours drive from Rio de Janeiro, and the many w...

David LeZaks, a Senior Fellow at the Croatan Institute, and David Strelneck, founder of Nourish, join us on the Lookfar Podcast to discuss the opportunities for farmers and the benefits for the public of regenerative agriculture. LeZaks and Strelneck tell us about the different dimensions of regenerative agriculture, discussing ecological, economic, social, and cultural drivers and ways in which n...

Rafaela Nicola and Gaston Fulquet of Wetlands International join us this month on the Lookfar Podcast. We talk about the many threats facing the world’s great wetlands and how Wetlands International’s community-centric efforts seek to combat those threats, working collaboratively with regional and local governments, civil society, and the private sector. Rafaela also shares insights from partnerin...

Paul Rice joins us on the Lookfar Podcast this week. Back in 1998, Paul founded Fair Trade USA and serves as its president and CEO. Paul shares with us his first introduction to fair trade when working with farmers in the mountains of Nicaragua in the 1980s. We then delve into Fair Trade today, with nearly one million farmers and workers from 62 countries selling products into the United States un...

The Lookfar Podcast returns to the Canandé Reserve in Ecuador this week, where we find a mostly dry and somewhat quiet spot to sit and talk with Martin Schaefer and Adriana Argoti of Fundación Jocotoco, which manages Canandé and fifteen other protected reserves across much of Ecuador’s most biodiverse and threatened ecosystems. Martin and Adriana talk with us about the significant new land acquisi...

This week on The Lookfar Podcast: Voices from the Wild , we visit with Third Millennium Alliance (TMA) at the Jama-Coaque Reserve in the Manabí Province of Ecuador. Joining us is TMA CEO Ryan Lynch and TMA’s Director of Research Mike Ellis, plus a quick visit with TMA biologist Moisés Tenorio and TMA co-founder Jerry Toth, who shares TMA’s vision for the future of the Pacific Forest of Ecuador --...

DOB Ecology CEO Maas Goote joins Scott and Lookfar COO Marlies Quirino on The Lookfar Podcast: Voices from the Wild . This is the first of three forthcoming episodes recorded last month in Ecuador -- this one in the Canandé Reserve while DOB Ecology and Lookfar visited with our partner Fundación Jocotoco. So enjoy the evening sounds of the rainforest accompanying our discussion! (We'll return in t...

Luli Masera is the Strategy and Partnerships Director for Rewilding Argentina, an Argentine nonprofit organization seeking to prevent species extinction and reverse environmental degradation, with the goal of restoring the functionality of ecosystems and the well-being of surrounding communities. Luli stops by the Lookfar Podcast to talk about the diverse array of landscapes in which Rewilding Arg...

Dr. Lilian Pintea of the Jane Goodall Institute joins us this week on The Lookfar Podcast: Voices from the Wild . From his upbringing in rural Moldova and Romania to his studies at Moscow State University and the University of Minnesota, Lilian has long been passionate about wild animals and their habitats. As Vice President for Conservation Science at the Jane Goodall Institute, Lilian has spent...

Avi Garbow joins us this week on The Lookfar Podcast: Voices from the Wild . Avi serves as the environmental advocate for Patagonia, Inc., whose corporate ethos and activism center on protecting the climate and conserving public lands while building ambitious environmental standards into its supply chains and customer outreach. Before joining Patagonia, Avi served in the Obama Administration, as G...

Majka Burhardt joins us this week on the Lookfar Podcast: Voices from the Wild. As a professional climber, conservation entrepreneur, author, mother of twins, and filmmaker, Majka has spent over two decades leading multi-stage international ventures focused on current issues of cultural and environmental significance spanning Africa, Europe, South and North America. Majka talks with Lookfar CEO Sc...

Joining us this week on The Lookfar Podcast: Voices from the Wild is Shelton Johnson, a park ranger with the U.S. National Park Service, stationed in Yosemite National Park. Shelton was featured on Ken Burns’ documentary The National Parks: America’s Best Idea in 2009 and is renowned for his eloquence in telling the story of the Buffalo Soldiers and his tireless efforts to champion diversity and i...

Clara Rowe is the first CEO of Restor, a pathbreaking data technology platform seeking to instill transparency, connectivity, and ecological insights in restoration efforts around the world. Clara brings a diverse range of conservation and sustainability experience to the tech-driven startup atmosphere of Restor, whose capabilities are rooted in cutting edge scientific research, including in parti...

Tucked away in the Mata Atlântica, the once great forests on the Atlantic coast of Brazil, is a small but ever growing reserve in the Guapiaçu valley barely two hours’ drive from Rio de Janeiro. Reserva Ecológica De Guapiaçu, or REGUA, is one of the most successful ecological restoration projects Lookfar has encountered, and this week we’re thrilled to have Nicholas Locke, REGUA’s president and fo...

Martin Schaefer is the CEO of Fundación Jocotoco, an Ecuadorian nonprofit organization dedicated to conserving the extraordinary biodiversity of Ecuador. Martin joins us on The Lookfar Podcast: Voices from the Wild to talk about Jocotoco’s origins, the remarkable network of protected reserves it has built over the past two decades, and the close ties it fosters with local communities. Martin also...

Mark Plotkin is an ethnobotanist, author, and activist. The founder and president of the Amazon Conservation Team (ACT), Mark joins us this week on The Lookfar Podcast: Voices from the Wild to talk about his life and work in the Amazon -- studying indigenous knowledge and empowering indigenous communities to preserve their heritage and protect their lands. Mark is the author of Tales of a Shaman’s...

Our national parks have been called America's best idea. The National Park Trust is one of America's best nonprofit organizations -- working tirelessly to preserve our national parks and connect kids across the country to nearby parks and other outdoor areas. This week, Grace Lee, Executive Director of the National Park Trust, joins us on The Lookfar Podcast to talk about the Park Trust's work acq...

The extraordinary Kris Tompkins joins us this week on The Lookfar Podcast: Voices from the Wild. Kris talks with Lookfar founder Scott Stone about her time as CEO of Patagonia, Inc., and how coming from a business background shaped her approach to conservation. Kris also talks about the nearly 30 years she, along with her late husband Doug Tompkins, devoted to rewilding locally extirpated species,...

This week on The Lookfar Podcast: Voices from the Wild , Scott Stone of Lookfar Conservation talks to Jerry Toth, Co-Founder of the Third Millennium Alliance, about his nonprofit organization’s remarkable origins in the Pacific Equatorial Forests of Western Ecuador and how he is creating a more sustainable future in one of the most imperiled and biodiverse regions of the world.