Rewilding Chile took the spotlight at Cambridge: Ecological Restoration Projects Lead Global Conference
The transformation of a cattle ranch into a conservation territory and the creation of the southernmost national park on the continent were presented by Rewilding Chile during the opening of the “Rewilding Futures: Shaping Tomorrow’s Wild” conference.
With the keynote speech titled “National Parks as a Strategy for Large-Scale Conservation, Connectivity, and Local Development: The Case Study of Chilean Patagonia”, Carolina Morgado, Executive Director of Rewilding Chile Foundation, opened the international ecological restoration conference held on January 17-18 at the University of Cambridge, England, where speakers from around the world shared their insights.
Rewilding Chile, the legacy of Tompkins Conservation, is widely recognized in the conservation field as one of the most successful examples of rewilding. The Cambridge conference was attended by over 450 participants, including professionals, academics, researchers, and representatives from NGOs, the public sector, and private industry.
“We are deeply honored to exchange experiences with leaders from the world’s foremost organizations working on wildlife restoration. We share a common commitment to recovering biodiversity, the beauty, and the abundance of nature as a way to tackle the climate and extinction crises,” stated Carolina Morgado.
During the opening session of the event, titled “Rewilding Futures: Shaping Tomorrow’s Wild”, Morgado presented two key conservation projects led in collaboration with Tompkins Conservation: the transformation of Patagonia National Park (in the Aysén region) from a cattle ranch into a conservation area, where successful ecological restoration programs have been implemented, and the ongoing creation of the future Cabo Froward National Park in the Magallanes region, at the southern tip of South America. The latter will form part of a scenic 2,800-kilometer route stretching from Puerto Montt to Cape Horn, comprising 17 national parks. This initiative protects nearly 12 million hectares and benefits over 60 communities through nature-based tourism, collectively known as the Route of Parks of Patagonia.
“With Patagonia National Park, where we’ve been working for 20 years alongside Tompkins Conservation, we’ve proven that it is possible to restore an ecosystem’s original relationship with the species that have always inhabited it. Cabo Froward, our most recent project, marks a significant step in consolidating the Route of Parks of Patagonia as a territorial vision centered on creating national parks as a strategy for large-scale conservation, territorial connectivity, and a driver of local economies,” Morgado concluded.
About Rewilding Chile
Rewilding Chile, formerly Tompkins Conservation Chile, is a non-profit organization founded by Douglas and Kristine Tompkins, who in the early 1990s devoted their lives to conserving the beauty and biodiversity of Chilean Patagonia to combat the extinction crisis and climate change.
The organization promotes rewilding as a comprehensive conservation strategy across the Route of Parks of Patagonia through the creation of terrestrial and marine national parks, ecosystem restoration, and strengthening the connection between communities and nature.