Who is Who at the WCF?

Christophe Boesch, founder and president of the Wild Chimpanzee Foundation, has studied the chimpanzees of Taï National Park in Ivory Coast for over 20 years, and is presently directing the Department of Primatology at the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology. He is the author of many scientific publications on chimpanzee behavior.

Hedwige Boesch-Achermann is the acting director of the WCF European representation. She lived for 12 years in Taï National Park, where she observed and analyzed the behavior of the Taï chimpanzees. She is co-author with Christophe Boesch of various publications.

Tobias Deschner came to the Taï -forest for the first time in 1995. He wrote his masters thesis on the Olive Colobus and in 1998 he started a Ph.D. on the behaviour of the Taï chimpanzees. In the WCF he assists with public relation in Germany.

Zoro Bertin Gone Bi entered the Taï chimpanzee project for his master thesis in 1997 and is presently finishing his Ph.D. he did on the diet of the wild chimpanzees and the fruit production of the Taï forest. Within the WCF, he is the programme officer of the west african representation in Abidjan.

Since 1992, Ilka Herbinger has spent five years in the Taï Forest. She worked as volunteer habituating chimpanzees for eco-tourism, and conducted both her masters research and her Ph.D. thesis on the territorial behaviour of Taï chimpanzees. Within the WCF, Ilka concentrates on the implementation of actions in Africa. Since January 2004 Ilka directs the African Office of the Wild Chimpanzee Foundation, situated in Abidjan, Côte d’Ivoire.

Francis Lauginie was the first representative of the WCF for West and Central Africa from the beginning of 2001 until the end of 2003. Occupying this position, he helped to put into operation our local activities. He has many years of experience in conservation (founding president of the first Ivorian NGO for the protection of nature, technical advisor to several ministers who are responsible for the national parks, first representative of the WWF for West Africa) and will from now on mainly concentrate on developing the activities of Afrique Nature International. However, he will stay a privileged supporter and consultant of the WCF.

FABRICE FAYD’HERBE DE MAUDAVE Managing director of a management consultancy company specializing in financial systems for non profits and international organizations.

With clients such as World Wide Fund For Nature, Traffic International, The International Gorilla Conservation Programme, and La Station Biologique De La Tour Du Valat, Fabrice has been working with the world of conservation for many years.

Fabrice first came into contact with chimpanzees while growing up in Tanzania, and during his four years in the Côte d'Ivoire. There he fed and rehabilitated an abandoned full grown female chimpanzee before returning her to the wild. This close contact with a chimpanzee opened Fabrice's eyes to the fact that chimpanzees are not part of the so called animal kingdom, but rather belong to a world which is human--with a few missing elements such as speech....

As co-founder and vice-president of the Wild Chimpanzee Foundation, Fabrice will be responsible for insuring that the financial assets of the foundation are governed in a fair and prudent manner in order to insure proper accounting on and reporting of the resources of the Foundation.

Paul N’Goran is affiliated with CSRS Abidjan, Côte d’Ivoire, as a PhD student of MPI-Leipzig (Max-Planck Institut) and University of Abobo–Ajamé. His PhD thesis deals with the development and setup of bio-monitoring programs mainly of the national parks Taï and Marahoué. This project is conducted in close cooperation with the park authorities, the OIPR (Office Ivoirien des Parcs et Réserves) and the WCF.
Paul has a master in natural sciences with emphasis a.o. on bio-diversity and sustainable management of eco-systems. He made his thesis within a BIOTA Project (Biodiversity Monitoring Transect Analysis in Africa). This work revealed his passion for nature and conservation which makes him a most precious supporter of the WCF.

Gregoire Nohon is from the village of Ponan near Taï, Côte d'Ivoire. In 1986, he became the first African field assistant in the Taï Chimpanzee project; Gregoire is now an expert in chimpanzee behavior. He is active in the WCF effort to save the chimpanzees and the rainforest in the Taï region, working particularly with projects involving schoolchildren and the villagers.

I am pleased to announce that Gregoire Nohon, the first local assistant of the "Tai Chimpanzee Project" and of the "Wild Chimpanzee Foundation" has been awarded the Charles Southwick Conservation Education Commitment Award. Please read more details in the attachment. [pdf]

Camille Troh Dji participates in the establishment of the "Naturmuseum" in the Banco Nationalpark in Abidjan, as well as in the bio-monitoring project in this park. Camille became an expert in chimpanzee observation through his yearlong implication as a field assistant in the chimpanzee research project (TCP) in the Taï NP in Côte d'Ivoire.

Julia Riedel helped in 2003 with the habituation of a chimpanzee community in Taï Nationalpark. Since 2004 she is doing her PhD at the Max-Planck Institute for evolutionary Anthropology in Leipzig. Her PhD topic studies the social networks of wild chimpanzees. She is supporting a school exchange program between German and Ivorian schools for the WCF.