Committed to a New Approach
The Lugenda Wildlife Reserve is the largest privately operated concession block nestled within the Niassa National Reserve, a protected area in northern Mozambique larger than the state of Denmark.
With a scale that would make it Mozambique's second largest National Park, the Lugenda Wildlife Reserve boasts 4,500 square kilometres (445,500 Ha) of dense miombo woodlands, breathtaking granite inselbergs, open savannah, wetlands, river flood planes and riverine forest, and hosts around 300km of beautiful Lugenda River riverfront.
The reserve has historically been supported through commercial consumptive safari activities, with photographic and adventure safaris less substantially contributing to income-generation.
Unlike many reserves where communities exist and are managed in buffer zones outside of reserve boundaries, the Lugenda Wildlife Reserve community exists right in the heart of the reserve. Currently, 6 villages - representing 1203 households and over 5,100 individuals - directly benefit from a 50,000 hectare community-dedicated corridor of prime reserve area.
In spite of critical challenges, including an elephant poaching crisis between 2011 and 2018, community engagement has always been at the center of Lugenda’s approach to sustainable conservation.
Community-owned Conservation
Building on twenty-three years of conservation engagement and trust-building with the Lugenda Wildlife Reserve community, the Lugenda Foundation was established in June 2023 as a fully compliant and legal Mozambican entity and conduit for strengthening partnerships and philanthropic investment in conservation and reserve-based community.
The Lugenda Foundation leads the reserve's strategic focus of implementing relevant livelihoods opportunities, capacity building and facilitating philanthropic support for the multi-phased journey towards an innovative transition of ownership and conservation responsibility to the community.
The Lugenda Wildlife Reserve's commercial activities' profits are invested directly into community, including direct cash benefits to households as of 2024.
Our Focus Areas
Impact
Measuring Success Through Our Achievements
COMMUNITY SCOUT INITIATIVE
ENVIRONMENTAL MONITORING
Transitioning from primary law enforcement focus, including formation of all female community troop and community guardians.
$750,700
COMMUNITY EMPLOYMENT INVESTMENT
150 full time employees, &
120-300 seasonal employees.
CLIMATE-SMART
RENEWABLE ENERGY PROJECTS
Safari camps (5) fully solarized by end 2025.
Climate-smart agriculture implemented in Protected Agricultural Units (PAUs).
CONSERVATION
ART
FULL SIZE ELEPHANT SCULPTURES
Created using illegal poaching and mining materials collected by scouts.
1203
HOUSEHOLDS REACHED
Receiving an annual direct cash benefit from Lugenda Wildlife Reserve commercial income.
$
COMMUNITY INITIATIVE INVESTMENTS
Community scouts & other development initiatives.
Get Involved
Key philanthropic partnerships and unrestricted giving are vital to the reserve and Lugenda Foundation's strategic implementation of a community-based natural resource management (CBNRM) led approach that:
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Engages community toward recognising themselves as the primary sharehoIders in natural resource management,
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Measures community and environmental resilience,
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Understands evidence-based impacts of "doing conservation" through both commercial and philanthropic activities, and
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Increases opportunities and investment within the reserve for both people and natural resources.
To strengthen its partnership opportunities, the Lugenda Foundation has partnered with a US 501(c)(3) in the US to support funding and partnerships that provide non-restricted, or less restricted, funding through a trust-based philanthropic approach.
This supports a contextually-led application of funds for partners that require a US-based not-for-profit entity as the prime fiduciary for initiatives. Additionally, the entity facilitates the benefit of tax-deductible giving for US-based funders, organisation an individuals.