Mohamed Bin Zayed Species Conservation Fund

Mohamed Bin Zayed Species Conservation Fund is a philanthropic endowment that promotes species conservation, founded since its 2008 inception by His Highness Sheikh Mohamed Bin Zayed Al Nahyan, the Crown Prince of Abu Dhabi and Deputy Supreme Commander of the UAE Armed Forces.

To date, the Fund has supported more than 2,000 projects – many of which have discovered new species, protected endangered landscapes, supported hundreds of students and leveraged tens of millions of dollars in new funding. These grants have gone to people in more than 160 different countries and benefitted more than 1,200 endangered species and subspecies.

The Fund is also the executing agency for the Global Environment Facility-funded Global Dugong and Seagrass Conservation Project, which spans eight countries across the Indo-Pacific region. The Fund believes in the power of people to make a difference in the world. Through its small grants programme it empowers thousands of species conservationists, people with a passion for nature who dedicate their lives to the species they love, to fight extinction with boots-on-the-ground species conservation projects targeting the world’s most vulnerable plants and animals.

The financial resources to support these grants are supplied by returns on its endowment. Since its inception, the Fund has managed to increase the value of its endowment while also supplying millions of dollars to projects globally. One hundred percent of these investment returns go to support species conservation projects.

Although the Mohamed Bin Zayed Species Conservation Fund has already had a major impact in preserving nature and species across the globe, its impact on the world is only just beginning.