Wednesday, February 20th, 2013
Flaherty Learning Center, Bronx Zoo
7pm- 9pm
The Bronx Zoo’s American Association of Zoo Keepers Chapter
invites you to its first Panel Discussion Evening on Wednesday, February 20th
in the Bronx Zoo’s Flaherty Learning Center from 7-9 PM. The evening’s focus
will be on WCS’s role in Global Conservation. The Global Conservation Panel
consists of Dr. Elizabeth Bennett, Vice President for Species Conservation at
WCS and Dr. Josh Ginsberg, Senior Vice President of Global Conservation at WCS.
Dr. Elizabeth Bennett and Dr. Josh Ginsberg will give a short presentation
highlighting the work that WCS’s Global Conservation team is involved with.
After the presentation, the floor will be open for questions and discussions.
All staff and volunteers are welcome. We ask that attendees
participate in our potluck dinner. Please RSVP with what dish or beverage you
will bring before Feb 15th to Cindy Maur. To learn more about Dr.
Elizabeth Bennett and Dr. Josh Ginsberg please see below.
For Chapter members, this event also serves as a meeting. We
will announce the results from the vote on the chapter’s name change. Members
will also have the opportunity to showcase poster presentations on the charity
they would like the chapter to fundraise for at this year’s Bar-nanza. Chapter
members will be asked to vote on the charity for Bar-nanza by the end of the
night’s event.
Dr. Elizabeth Bennett
Elizabeth (Liz) Bennett is the Vice President for Species
Conservation at WCS. Born in the UK, she went to Nottingham University to read
zoology, and then to Cambridge University where she gained her PhD for research
on the ecology of primates in Peninsular Malaysia. She moved to Sarawak,
Malaysia in 1984, and worked there for the next 18 years. She started there by
conducting the first ever detailed field study of the proboscis monkey,
followed by studies of the effects of hunting and logging on wildlife. Her time
in Sarawak culminated in her leading a team, with WCS and Sarawak Government
staff, to write a comprehensive wildlife policy for the State, and subsequently
to head a unit within the Government to oversee its implementation. This
included providing technical input for new wildlife laws, overseeing their
implementation through education and enforcement programs, and assisting in
planning Sarawak’s protected area system. After that, Liz became Director,
Hunting and Wildlife Trade Program at WCS. This included working with WCS field
staff to develop policies on bushmeat trade in Central Africa and a strategy to
address illegal wildlife trade in China, and providing technical support to WCS
field staff working on hunting and wildlife trade worldwide. Her current role
involves overseeing WCS’s species conservation programs globally. Liz has
trained wildlife practitioners at many levels, from post-graduate students to
government wildlife staff in Sarawak, Sabah, Myanmar, Taiwan and mainland
China. She has published widely, with more than 120 scientific and popular
publications, including seminal publications on hunting in tropical forests and
illegal wildlife trade. Her services to conservation have been recognized by
her being awarded the “Golden Ark” award by Prince Bernhard of the Netherlands
(1994), “Pegawai Bintang Sarawak” (PBS) by the Sarawak State Government (2003),
“Member of the Most Excellent Order of the British Empire” (MBE) by Her Majesty
Queen Elizabeth II (2005), and
D.Sc. (honoris causa) by Nottingham
University, UK (2008).
Dr. Josh Ginsberg
Joshua Ginsberg was born and raised in New York and is
currently Senior Vice President, Global Conservation at the Wildlife
Conservation Society where he oversees an $80 million portfolio of conservation
initiatives in 60 countries around the world.
He spent 15 years working as a field biologist in Thailand and across
East and Southern Africa leading a variety of mammal ecology and conservation
projects. As Director of the Asia and Pacific Program at the Wildlife
Conservation Society from 1996 until September 2004, Josh oversaw 100 projects
in 16 countries. Dr. Ginsberg was also
Acting Director of the WCS Africa Program for 10 months in 2002 and Vice
President for Conservation Operations from 2003-2009. He received a B. Sc. from
Yale, and holds an M.A. and Ph.D. from Princeton in Ecology and Evolution. He
served as the Chairman of the NOAA/NMFS Hawaiian Monk Seal Recovery Team from
2001-2007. Dr. Ginsberg sits on the Board of the Open Space Institute, the
Catskill Mountain Keeper, and was a founding board member of Video Volunteers,
and of the Blacksmith Institute on whose board he still sits. He has held faculty positions at Oxford
University and University College London, and is an Adjunct Professor at
Columbia University where he teaches conservation biology and international
relations of the environment. He has supervised 18 Masters and seven Ph. D.
students. He is an author on over 50 reviewed papers, and has edited three
books on wildlife conservation, ecology and evolution.
Julie Kunen
Julie Kunen, an expert on
forestry and natural resource management in Latin America, rejoined WCS in 2011
after a career that began as a 14-year old summer intern in the Bronx Zoo’s
camel barn. An archaeologist by
profession, she was inspired to become a field scientist while working after
college in the public affairs office at the Central Park Zoo, a job that involved
fundraising for WCS’s international program.
Since then, Julie has conducted years of fieldwork in Central American
forests focused on natural resources use among the ancient Maya. She has managed and advised on biodiversity
conservation and climate change programs in Bolivia, Colombia, Ecuador,
Guatemala, Haiti, Mexico, Peru, and the eastern Caribbean. As a senior environmental policy advisor at
the US Agency for International Development, she led creation of USAID’s first
Climate Change and Development Strategy and advised the Government of Peru on
forestry law and forest governance issues.
Julie is currently the director of WCS’s Latin America and Caribbean
program, where she oversees conservation activities in 13 countries.
