- Leonardo DiCaprio’s conservation group Re:wild has launched the Phoenix Species Project with the Bezos Earth Fund, a $200 million effort aimed at recovering 100 critically endangered species across 30 countries.
- More than 100 local and international partners will lead the work using strategies tailored to each species, including conservation breeding, habitat restoration and disease management.
- Targeted species range from Madagascar’s golden-crowned sifaka to the bowmouth guitarfish and a tiny South African succulent called the fuzzy belly button.
Leonardo DiCaprio has put $200 million behind an attempt to save 100 of the world’s most endangered species from extinction – the largest single philanthropic effort of its kind ever attempted.
DiCaprio’s organization Re:wild has teamed up with the Bezos Earth Fund to launch the Phoenix Species Project, a $200 million effort dedicated entirely to pulling 100 critically endangered species back from the edge of extinction.
The funding splits evenly – $100 million from the Bezos Earth Fund and $100 million from Re:wild, with additional backing from DiCaprio, Age of Union and the Todd Graves Family Foundation. Organizers call it the largest single philanthropic initiative ever aimed at recovering endangered species across this many habitats and countries at once.
“Species on the brink of extinction are often the ones that anchor some of the world’s most important ecosystems,” DiCaprio said in a statement. “When we protect those species, we also protect the forests, wetlands, grasslands, and oceans they depend on.”
Among the 100 species targeted is the golden-crowned sifaka, a critically endangered primate found only in the forests of northern Madagascar. Association Fanamby, the local group receiving a Phoenix Species Project grant, has been protecting the sifaka for years on a fraction of the budget it needed.
“This funding, this global platform and technical support change what is possible,” said Tiana Andriamanana, Association Fanamby’s executive director. “We are no longer only holding the line against extinction; we can begin to bring the gold of Madagascar’s northern forests back.”
The other 99 species span mammals, amphibians, reptiles, birds, fish, invertebrates and plants, including the bowmouth guitarfish, the Hickory Nut Gorge green salamander, Australia’s night parrot and a tiny desert succulent called the fuzzy belly button, illegally harvested for the ornamental plant trade in South Africa.
Each species gets its own implementing partner and recovery plan, built in collaboration with the IUCN Species Survival Commission, and the project says it will publicly track population recovery over time.
“One hundred species, thirty countries, and a real commitment to bringing them back. Not managing their decline. Recovering them,” said Lauren Sánchez Bezos, vice chair of the Bezos Earth Fund. “We know how to do this. We just have to stay committed long enough to see it through.”
