Africa Region Board of Directors
The Africa Region of the Society for Conservation Biology has an international following of members that support conservation on the African continent. The board of directors is an elected body that facilitates the goals and activities of the Region.
Future Members
If you are interested in being a member of the African Board you must be a member of SCB and a member of the Region. Generally two-to-four board members are elected annually. The Call for Nominations goes out in September or October and the election runs in October or November. Region members receive an email about the open positions and the start of the election process.
Current Board Members
Badru Mugerwa, President, SCB Africa Region and ICCB 2023 Steering Committee Chair
Badru trained in wildlife ecology and conservation at the University of Western Ontario, Canada, University of Oxford, UK, Mbarara University of Science and Technology, Uganda, and Makerere University, Uganda. He is a research associate at the Institute of Tropical Forest Conservation (ITFC) in Uganda. Badru’s research focuses on human impacts on biodiversity and protected area management in human dominated landscapes.
Term ends on 31 December 2025
LinkedIn | Twitter | Member Spotlight
Adedotun Onoyinka Afolayan (Ph.D.), President-elect
Adedotun is the President-elect of SCB Africa Region. She is also the President of Nigerian Chapter of the Society for Conservation Biology (NSCB). She is an Assistant Director (Research) at the National Centre for Genetic Resources and Biotechnology (NACGRAB), a national research Institute with the mandate of conserving diverse genetic resources of Nigeria for sustainable utilization and posterity. She currently Heads the Plant Tissue Culture Unit of the Institute, where she teams up with colleagues to use in vitro propagation techniques as a medium-term conservation tool for the preservation of Nigeria's various plant genetic resources. Her research studies cut across the environmental assessment of pollution levels within different environmental components; the determination of the impacts of plant extracts on fish reproduction, and plant biodiversity conservation using plant tissue culture techniques. She is an alumnus of Wageningen University of Research’s Netherland Fellowship Programme (NFP) and the International Foundation for Science (IFS). Adedotun earned her Ph.D. in Ecology and Environmental Biology from the University of Ibadan, Nigeria. She also supervises undergraduate student projects at the Departments of Biology as well as Environmental Science and Resources Management, of the Ibadan Chapter of National Open University of Nigeria
Term ends on 31 December 2025
LinkedIn | Academia | Website
Margaret Awuor Owuor, Education and Science Officer
Margaret is an Assistant Professor in Integrative Biodiversity Conservation Science at the Wyss Academy for Nature at the University of Bern with affiliation at the Institute of Ecology and Evolution, University of Bern. Previously, Margaret worked as a Lecturer in the Department of Hydrology and Aquatic Sciences, South Eastern Kenya University, Kenya. Margaret has a lot of interest in working with communities using transformative approaches to conserve freshwater, marine and coastal ecosystems, such as the assessment of ecosystem services. Though mainly trained in ecology, she has over the last seven years gained interest in issues at the intersection of science-policy-conservation-economics, spanning government, community practitioners and non-governmental sectors. Margaret is part of the National Geographic Rolex Amazon Expedition where she is implementing the socio economic assessment of mangrove ecosystem services in Cųruca, Para, Brazil. Margaret enjoys working with community groups to educate and empower them. Her research work on mapping and valuation of ecosystem services has also led to her winning grants from different organization like MASMA grant by Western Indian Ocean Marine Science Association, the National Geographic Early Career grant to map the flow of mangrove ecosystem services in Mtwapa Creek and National Geographic Support for Women Grant (Lyda Hill) and WWF Russell E. Train fellowship on Ocean Management to carry out her project on valuation and mapping of mangrove ecosystem services in Mida Creek using the choice experiments and the matrix approach. Owuor holds a Ph.D in Marine and Coastal Management (### Laude) from the University of Cadiz, Spain. She is the Education and Science Officer of the Society for Conservation Biology, Africa Region.
Term ends on 31 December 2024
LinkedIn | Twitter
Michelle Fasona, Financial Monitoring and Evaluation Officer
Fasona Michelle completed her Ph.D. at the University of Lagos, Nigeria. Her dissertation focused on landscape ecology modelling, landscape genetics and habitat connectivity for Large mammals in selected forest reserves in South-West, Nigeria. She is currently the Financial Monitoring and evaluation Officer
Term ends on 31 December 2024
LinkedIn
Frowin Becker, Information Officer
Frowin is an early career conservation scientist from Namibia, who recently completed his Ph.D. in Conservation Biology at the Victoria University of Wellington in New Zealand. Over the years, his research has focused on avian ecology. He is currently concentrating his efforts on using sound (particularly bird calls) and bird communities to monitor environmental changes. In February 2023, Frowin took on a role at the Ongava Research Centre in Namibia’s Greater Etosha Landscape. As the Information Officer, Frowin manages the Region's mailing list and social media platforms, as well as extracting and sharing information on research, scholarships, and jobs among members
Term ends on 31 December 2024.
LinkedIn | Google Scholar | ResearchGate
Clare Kyasiimire, Diversity, Equity, Inclusion and Justice Officer (DEIJ Officer)
Clare is an accomplished community development professional with extensive experience in working with farmers, conservation and research organizations, government agencies and the private sector to promote community-based natural resources management and conservation initiatives. She has first-hand experiences of challenges and opportunities in working with rural communities in Uganda, Kenya, Ethiopia, Rwanda and Tanzania. She currently works with Uganda Wildlife Authority and does consultancies in the areas of Conservation Policy Analysis and Programme Management. Clare also serves as Grants Coordinator for SCB's (global) Chapters Committee.
Term ends on 31 December 2025.
Janette Wallis, Member-at-large # 1
Janette is a primatologist whose primary interest is chimpanzees, baboons, and other African primates. She serves as the Editor-in-Chief of the IUCN journal African Primates and is Co-Vice Chair of the IUCN SSC Primate Specialist Group’s Africa Region. In addition, Janette is a Scientific Advisor for the Plastic Pollution Coalition and serves on the boards of Kids Saving the Rainforest and the Tonkolili Chimpanzee Project. She is the Executive Director of the Kasokwa-Kityedo Forest Project in Uganda, where her research focuses on behavioral ecology of chimpanzees and the various effects of forest fragmentation. She also has an ongoing interest in the topics of primate conservation, disease transmission, and tourism.
Term ends on 31 December 2024
LinkedIn | Twitter
Jean Bernard Ndayambaje, Member-at-Large #2
Bernard is a Senior Lecturer and Head of the Chemistry Department at the University of Rwanda. He completed his Ph.D. in Biotechnology at the Anna University, India. His research interests include extraction and purification of biologically active compounds from natural resources, screening for therapeutic uses against various disorders, detailed study on the molecular mechanism of action using various cell-based assay systems. Additionally, he also conducts research on the enzyme-assisted extraction of important compounds from spices and fruits for crop improvement and disease resistance. He is the Member-at-Large #2 and will be responsible for managing the Region's physical office in Rwanda.
Term ends on 31 December 2024.
Jean Aimé Ruticumugambi, Member-at-large #3
Jean Aimé is a landscape ecologist fascinated by the patterns and determinants of species richness and composition in space and time in both natural and human-modified landscapes and largely in tropical agricultural landscapes. Jean Aimé is a Lecturer at Rwanda Polytechnic, Integrated Polytechnic Regional College (IPRC), Kitabi, and he is on study leave for a Doctoral study in Bioscience Engineering at Ghent University in Belgium. Jean Aimé is a member of various professional organizations, as well as Secretary of SCB Rwanda Chapter, Honorary research fellow of University of Rwanda in the center of Excellence in Biodiversity and Natural resources management (UR-CoEB). Jean Aimé serves as the SCB-Africa Region’s Member at Large #3 and Students representative. He is currently pursuing a PhD research on landscape scale impact of agroforestry on functional biodiversity in Rwanda.
Term ends on 31 December 2024.
Harrison Ajebe Nnoko, Membership and Nominations Officer
Harrison is a seasoned manager, professional forester and community development mapping & land use planning expert working as Executive President (CEO) of AJEMALEBU SELF HELP (AJESH) since 2010. AJESH works on nature-based approaches focusing on natural resources management targeting issues of land governance, ecosystem restoration, forest conservation; participatory mapping and land use planning, defending community access rights to resources; climate change mitigation, adaptation, and resilience approaches; forest governance, landscape, seascape and watershed management. Through the Cameroonian Civil Society Organization (CSO) network, Community and Forest Platform (CFP), Harrison has been very influential in the negotiations and implementation processes of the Voluntary Partnership Agreement of the Forest Law Enforcement Governance and Trade (VPA-FLEGT), signed between Cameroon and the European Union. An initiative that is currently extending to Asia timber and other forest product consumer countries, especially China and Vietnam, and Harrison has been part of the CSO team of experts that analyzed Chinese involvement in the forest and natural resources sector in Cameroon and the Congo Basin. The work of Harrison and AJESH has received several appreciations including an honorific award in 2016 from the prestigious Momentum for Change Climate Neutral Now Initiative, launched by the Secretariat of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC), alongside the Rainforest Foundation UK, for successfully bringing community voices to contextual climate solutions. Harrison also received an Award of Excellency from the Cameroon Ministry of Forestry and Wildlife (MINFOF) for Exceptional Project Implementation of a forest governance project in Cameroon lodged with MINFOF
Term ends on 31 December 2025.