AWF and ESP Join Forces to Scale Community Enterprise in AWF Landscapes

The African Wildlife Foundation and Entrepreneurial Solutions Partners have signed a five-year partnership to help communities around protected areas earn lasting incomes from conservation. The work begins in Rwanda’s Volcanoes landscape and Uganda’s Kidepo Valley.

KIGALI, Rwanda – The African Wildlife Foundation (AWF), an African international conservation NGO and Entrepreneurial Solutions Partners (ESP), a pan-African entrepreneurship organisation, today signed a Memorandum of Understanding in Kigali, Rwanda to scale AWF's community enterprise work in Africa's conservation landscapes, expanding its impact by expanding opportunities for local communities to become part of biodiversity economies through ESP's expertise in enterprise development, market access and financing. This partnership will start by scaling AWF’s existing work in two landscapes—one in Rwanda and one in Uganda.

The five-year framework builds on AWF's belief that when people own, benefit from and value wildlife and wild lands, they will make the cultural, economic and policy choices to sustain them. AWF and ESP share the conviction that conservation and economic development reinforce each other—when communities earn a decent living from the landscapes around protected areas, they gain a stake in protecting them. The partnership aims to translate conservation investments into stronger enterprises, higher household incomes and sustainable jobs, resulting in thriving wildlife, secured habitats and a better long-term quality of life for people.

AWF CEO Kaddu Sebunya signing the Memorandum of Understanding with ESP. © AWF

The partnership brings complementary strengths. AWF contributes more than six decades of conservation expertise, an established presence in landscapes, and long-standing relationships with communities, governments and the private sector developed through years of livelihood and conservation enterprise efforts. ESP contributes its experience in enterprise development, value creation, market access and financing for African entrepreneurs. In Rwanda's Volcanoes landscape, where AWF works alongside the Rwanda Development Board (RDB), the growing mountain gorilla population means Volcanoes National Park must increase habitat for wildlife while improving the wellbeing of people living around the park. The partnership will focus on helping households affected by the park's restoration by building viable livelihoods and enterprises, starting with 547 households in the first phase, with the ambition of reaching more than 3,500 households over time.

In Uganda's Kidepo Valley landscape, ESP will build on the foundational work AWF has begun with communities, including support for 2,280 cotton farmers adopting regenerative agricultural practices that improve yield while safeguarding wildlife corridors, and planned support for shea production reaching a further 4,320 people. This work complements programs that have been established by AWF and the Uganda Wildlife Authority.

"Conservation succeeds when the people who live alongside wildlife share in its value," said Kaddu Sebunya, Chief Executive Officer of the African Wildlife Foundation. "In places like Volcanoes and Kidepo, protecting nature and building prosperity must go hand in hand. By partnering with ESP, we are bringing enterprise, markets and finance into African-led, people-centred conservation, so that thriving wildlife and thriving communities become one and the same goal."

Eric Kacou, Co-Founder and CEO of ESP, alongside members of his team and Patrick Nsabimana following the Memorandum of Understanding signing ceremony. © AWF

“The families who live alongside Africa's wildlife should be shareholders in its natural wealth, not bystanders," said Eric Kacou, Co-Founder and Managing Partner of ESP. "By bringing skills, markets and Intelligent Capital™ to AWF's six decades of conservation leadership, we can build ventures that create lasting prosperity and give communities every reason to protect nature for generations."

Across both landscapes, the partners will work across four areas: building entrepreneurial pathways for households; developing enterprises and value chains from high-value horticulture to cotton and shea; restoring and sustainably managing the natural resources that livelihoods depend on; and opening up access to markets, finance and infrastructure.

About the African Wildlife Foundation

The African Wildlife Foundation is a pan-African conservation organisation established in 1961, headquartered in Nairobi, Kenya. AWF's mission is to ensure that wildlife and wild lands thrive in modern Africa, and it invests in African-led, people-centred conservation approaches in which sustainable development includes thriving wildlife and wild lands as a cultural and economic asset for future generations. Learn more at awf.org. 

About Entrepreneurial Solutions Partners 

ESP is a pan-African consulting and investment firm founded in 2011, with offices in Kigali, Abidjan, Nairobi and Dakar. Operating across 28 countries with a team of nearly 100 professionals, ESP deploys its proprietary Intelligent Capital™ methodology to support entrepreneurs and private sector ecosystems across Africa.

Driven by its core value of equity, ESP places youth, young women, and rural entrepreneurs  at the heart of its programs—reaching over 23,700 young women and extending opportunity beyond urban centres through dedicated rural outreach initiatives. ESP has supported more than 12,900 MSMEs, contributed to 43,153 direct jobs, and unlocked US$104.5 million in access to finance. Committed to a sustainable future, ESP actively embeds green transition considerations into its investment and advisory work to help entrepreneurs pursue growth that is both competitive and climate resilient. ESP’s institutional partners include the Mastercard Foundation, the World Bank Group, and the African Development Bank. 

For more information, visit https://www.espartners.co 

Media Contacts

• AWF: Eileen Kairu, Strategic Communications Manager – [email protected] 
• ESP: Eliane Yao, Communication and Branding Manager – [email protected]