Building the Future of Human–Wildlife Coexistence
Protecting lions, leopards, elephants, and the communities that share Namibia's wild landscapes.
Nakupenda Wildlife combines cutting-edge science, long-term monitoring, and community partnerships to protect Namibia's most threatened wildlife and the people who live alongside it.
Across Namibia, we operate one of the country's largest long-term wildlife monitoring networks, generating the data needed to understand wildlife populations, reduce human–wildlife conflict, and guide conservation action where it matters most.
Our Impact
We don't just study wildlife from a distance. We place cameras on the ground for years at a time, employ local community members as conservation partners, and work alongside conservancies, lodges, researchers, and government agencies to build conservation programs that last far beyond a single grant cycle.
Our projects
Even One Livestock Kill can be a Lion’s Death Sentence
Our Flagship Project: Saving the Lions of the Klip River Valley
In the ≠Khoadi-//Hôas Conservancy of north-west Namibia, lions and people share an unfenced landscape. Here, every livestock kill represents not only an economic loss for a family, but also a potential threat to the future of a lion. Our flagship program combines long-term camera-trap monitoring with a community-based reporting network to understand exactly where, when, and why conflict occurs before it happens.
To date, the project has generated:
- More than 15,000 wildlife detections
- More than 2,000 detections of large carnivores
- Continuous monitoring across one of Namibia's most important community-managed landscapes
By combining ecological data with information collected directly by local families, we are building one of the most detailed pictures of human–lion coexistence currently available in southern Africa.
This project sits at the heart of our work - and it is the one that needs your support most urgently.
From Woodland to Desert: A National Research Network
Lions are only part of the story
Across ecologically distinct landscapes the Klip River Valley, Fish River Canyon, passing by the Namib Desert in Koireb, near Solitaire, we run one of the only standardized long-term carnivore monitoring networks in southern Africa.
Using the same scientific framework across every site allows us to answer some of conservation's most important questions:
- How do human land-use practices shape predator behaviour?
- How do carnivores respond to increasing aridity?
- What is the impact of fencing on wildlife populations?
- Which conservation strategies actually work across different ecosystems?
From mountain savanna to true desert, every camera contributes to a single national-scale conservation effort.
Beyond Large Carnivores
Protecting a landscape means protecting everything that lives within it
While lions, cheetahs, leopards and other carnivores remain at the center of our work, our research also supports conservation of:
- Desert-adapted elephants
- Critically endangered black rhino
- Hartmann's mountain zebra
- Giraffe
- Cape clawless otter
- Dozens of additional mammal species
Each species tells part of a larger story about ecosystem health, resilience, and coexistence.
Conservation Built With Communities.
The landscapes where we work are not empty wilderness.
They are home to the Damara and Nama communities who have lived alongside wildlife for generations.
Conservation succeeds here only when local people benefit from it.
That is why our model goes beyond scientific monitoring.
We employ local community members as field assistants and camera-trap monitors. We compensate families for participating in wildlife monitoring programmes. We support local conservation leadership and work within existing conservancy structures rather than around them.
Most importantly, we recognize that local knowledge of wildlife movement, seasonal changes, water availability, and conflict patterns is every bit as valuable as the data collected by our cameras.
Coexistence is not something we bring to these landscapes.
It is something communities have practiced for centuries.
Our role is to provide the science, tools, and incentives needed to strengthen it for future generations.
Built on Partnership
Our work is made possible through long-term collaboration with the organisations and communities that know these landscapes best.
Partners include:
Together, these partnerships transform field observations into conservation action and scientific research into real-world impact.
Your Support in Action
Put a Camera Trap in the Field
A €100 donation helps purchase and deploy a camera trap capable of monitoring wildlife continuously for years, providing critical information on species that are otherwise rarely seen.
€100
Support a Community Monitor for One Year
A €500 donation helps support a local family participating in our community-based monitoring programme, collecting essential information on predator presence, livestock losses, and emerging conflict hotspots.
€500
Keep Research Running
A €1,000 donation helps cover field logistics, vehicle costs, equipment maintenance, batteries, and data collection needed to sustain long-term wildlife monitoring.
€1,000
Become a Conservation Partner
Major contributions help expand monitoring networks, support student research, strengthen community programs, and generate the scientific evidence needed to guide conservation decisions across Namibia.
€5,000+
Every Detection Tells a Story.
A lion recorded crossing a valley at midnight.
A black rhino moving through an unfenced landscape.
A family choosing coexistence over retaliation.
These are not isolated events.
They are part of a long-term effort to build a future where people and wildlife continue to share the same landscapes.
With your support, that future remains possible.