We live in an increasingly fast-paced, industrialised world, and daily life often feels dominated by technology, financial pressures and the need to GO-GO-GO. It can all feel a bit overwhelming at times, which is why many of us find ourselves more and more gravitating towards the natural world as we get older to find a sense of peace in the craziness of life. Being in nature is a great antidote to modern life stresss and being an active participant in nature conservation carries a strong sense of purpose with it. Many of our guests have told us that this is why they book with Matson & Ridley Safaris. Conservation is, and always will be, central to our mission. Our conservation work doesn’t happen without you, our nature-connected community.
Above: My awesome elephant conservation group on safari with me in Rwanda with me in 2022
Over the past few decades of living and breathing conservation in our work and lives, one of the things Andy and I have learned about how to maximise our impact in conservation is the importance of working with local, experienced partners on the ground. In 2014, when we started Matson & Ridley Safaris, a business founded in Singapore (later moved to Australia in 2017), our goal was to work with trusted partners in Africa who shared our values around working with local communities for wildlife conservation to achieve conservation through high value tourism. Over the years, through the safaris that our guests have booked with us, we have contributed millions of dollars to conservation in Africa. This approach to conservation ensures that local people benefit from the wildlife economy generated by tourists in a sustainable way. It transforms areas that were once depleted of wildlife due to poaching into wildlife refuges where local people work in the lodges or as rangers. Conservation tourism in partnership with local communities has been a game changer all across Africa where it is done well, in countries including Botswana, Namibia and Rwanda. If you've ever been on safari with me, or on a safari I booked for you, you will have seen this first hand.
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The Akagera Elephant Project, Rwanda
On top of our core business of conservation tourism, we have also supported and, in some cases led, the development of meaningful conservation projects where needed, such as the Akagera Elephant Project, based in Akagera National Park, Rwanda since 2018. This project, which quite a few of our guests joined me on to assist with data collection over the years, developed the foundations of the first elephant identification database for the national park, alongside our partners in the Akagera Management Company and the local Akagera guide co-operative. The project collected the first baseline data on individual elephants in the park to complement work that the Akagera Management Corporation undertakes as part of their management of the elephant population.
During Covid, when there were no international tourism dollars coming into Africa, many of you reached out when we asked for your help for the local Akagera guides and their families in the communities bordering Akagera National Park. Our Covid relief program donated basic grocery supplies including food and household supplies. This made a huge difference to these families during a very difficult time.
A couple of very special guests have gone the extra mile in supporting the Akagera Elephant Project through my practical training of local guides in elephant identification in late 2022, and more recently in the sponsoring of a local elephant co-ordinator, Emerance Tuyipfukamire, to undertake regular field work and data analysis of the elephant population in Akagera. We are enormously grateful to our sponsors for this support. The need for a local qualified person to continue with the elephant work on the ground was something I identified early on would need to happen in the evolution of the project and we were grateful to have the support of the park in enabling this to happen in partnership with them.
Emerance was recruited to co-ordinate the elephant work in the park as part of the Akagera Management Company’s research team a few months ago, with her elephant work funded by us. She was selected from a large pool of applicants after an extensive interview process. Emerance has a Bachelor of Science from the University of Rwanda and also has experience working with the mountain gorillas in Rwanda. We are excited to have Emerance on the team as an emerging young, enthusiastic conservationist in Rwanda and taking the lead on collecting elephant identification data and analysis in Akagera and she will continue the work we started with the guides in the park to build local capacity for elephant conservation.
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The Triumph Conservation Trust
In other big news, Andy and I are excited to share that this month we started the Triumph Conservation Trust in memory of Andy’s Uncle Nigel. Professor Nigel Ridley-Thomas was a pioneering and highly respected geophysicist who spent most of his adult life in Hong Kong. He was also a great nature lover who cared deeply about the state of the planet and our impact on it. The Triumph Conservation Trust will be dedicated to wildlife restoration in both marine and land ecosystems across the world and we look forward to sharing more about it with you in the coming months.
For now, I can say that in its first year the Triumph Conservation Trust will support the Great Reef Census as part of Andy’s ongoing work at Citizens of the Reef to help restore coral reefs in the face of climate change. The Trust will also support a high impact conservation tourism project in southern Africa that will work with local communities to restore wildlife in vital habitat for African elephants and many other species (more details to come soon!). We are very excited to be able to provide a legacy for Nigel’s passion for the environment and we look forward to sharing more about our plans in the months to come.
Above: Photo of participants in the Great Reef Census by Citizens of the Reef
In the meantime, we have some great deals for safaris in Kenya, Tanzania, Botswana and Namibia at the moment, not to mention amazing gorilla trekking experiences in Rwanda. Please reach out to book your safaris for 2025 and 2026 and we’ll make sure your safari dollars go the extra mile for wildlife conservation. I have two rooms left on my Tanzania safari in May/June 2026 for those who want to join me in search of the big cats and the wildebeest migration in the Serengeti, Grumeti and Ngorongoro. I also have space for my Botswana safari in June 2025. Reach out for details!
Contact us about a safari today 😀
