Three young conservationists win coveted award
Thursday, 18 April 2024
More than 250 candidates from around the world competed in recent months for an international award for young (up to 35 years old) successful conservationists: the Future For Nature Award. An international independent expert jury selected Callie Veelenturf (31), Hana Weaver (32) and Rinzin Lama (33) as the three winners of 2024. They will receive their prize plus €50,000 each on Friday, 19 April 2024, at Royal Burgers' Zoo before an audience of hundreds of national and international guests.
Successful young conservationists
Callie Veelenturf works intensively with fishermen in Panama to minimise bycatch of leatherback and other sea turtle species. Hana Weaver protects the extremely rare Puerto Rican sharp-shinned hawk, of which only 19 birds survived Hurricane Maria in 2018. Rinzin Lama is working to conserve the snow leopard and its natural prey animals in remote mountainous regions of Nepal. For more information on their winning projects, visit https://www.futurefornature.org/award-event-2024/. The website will also host a live stream of the award ceremony on Friday, 19 April 2024.
Presentation of the Future For Nature Award 2024
Hundreds of guests from the Netherlands and abroad will convene at the Safari Meeting Centre in Burgers' Zoo on Friday afternoon, 19 April 2024, to witness guest of honour John D. Liu present the three winners with the Future For Nature Award 2024 and €50,000 per winner. Liu is a Chinese-American filmmaker and ecologist who in 2017 founded Ecosystem Restoration Camps, a global organisation that restores damaged ecosystems on a large scale.
National and international celebrities support Future For Nature's work
The Future For Nature Award will be presented for the 17th consecutive time at our zoo in 2024. Burgers’ Zoo is a co-founder of Future For Nature. The internationally recognised conservation award has previously been presented by Sir David Attenborough, Jane Goodall DBE, Frans de Waal, Redmond O'Hanlon and Frans Lanting, among others. His Royal Highness Willem-Alexander was the guest of honour at the tenth edition.
