UCU Directors & Staff

Uganda Conservation (U) Limited (UCU) is a not-for-profit company registered in Uganda to administer and control the activities of UCF within that country. The principal shareholder in UCU is UCF which holds 99.98% of the shareholding. The company is managed by a Board of Directors comprising local professionals and business people. They all support UCU on a voluntary basis.

Pictured below at a recent Directors' meeting at the UCU office in Kampala are, from left to right: Julia Lloyd, Lilly Ajarova, Andrew Roberts, Harriet Fowler, Patrick Agaba, Enid Kakooko, Jane Anywar Adong, Patrick Shah, Charlotte Beauvoisin (former VSO volunteer) and David Porter (former Chairman).

Directors

Michael Keigwin is the Founding Trustee of UCF and a Director of UCU, the Ugandan operational arm of the Charity. He has a close and intimate knowledge of Uganda having spent 9 years living amongst the people whilst running his Elephant, Crops & People project which led to the formation of UCF. Having returned to the UK in 2005 he completed an MBA at Durham Business School before joining Deloitte as a Senior Consultant for two years. In November 2011 he returned to live and establish a business in Uganda. Michael has played a key role in enforcing ‘conservation in action’ and as Operative Trustee oversees and directs the project work in Uganda.

Lillian Ajarova - Executive Director of CSWCT (Chimpanzee Sanctuary Wildlife Conservation Trust), Uganda

As a child growing up in Uganda, Lilly developed a passionate love for wildlife. She has worked and studied in Europe and Africa predominantly in tourism for both the private and public sectors.

Lilly’s eight year term at the Uganda Wildlife Authority UWA saw her serve in various senior management capacities including public relations manager, marketing manager, and tourism development manager representing UWA and the Uganda tourism and wildlife industry at various conferences and exhibitions across Africa and Europe.

Lilly consolidated this wide experience by pursuing a MBA at Maastricht School of Management Institute, ESAMI, focusing her research on Chimpanzee Tourism in Uganda. Lilly has been Executive Director of CSWCT since 2005 and in November 2009 was awarded a Responsible Tourism Award at the World Travel Market exhibition in London.

Jane Adong Anywar - Senior Consultant, Environmental Developmental Associates, Uganda

Jane is a Ugandan, qualified lawyer with LLM in International Law and drafting legal documents from Cave Hill Campus, University of the West Indies Barbados.

Jane has over ten years experience in the development, design and drafting of legal texts and legislation in the environmental management in Uganda and regionally. Jane most notably played a leading role in the design and formalisation of Mgahinga-Bwindi Impenetrable Forest Conservation Trust, that was established to provide long term and sustainable funding for research and financially viable community projects in south western Uganda, in order to relieve negative pressures by these communities on the Protected Areas.

Fred Babweteera - Director Budongo Forest Project, Masindi, Uganda; Lecturer Makerere University, Department of Forestry, Uganda

Fred is a tropical forest ecologist with experience in managing multidisciplinary conservation projects that provide pragmatic solutions to sustainable management of protected areas. He has provided advisory services to lead conservation agencies such as Uganda Wildlife Authority, National Forestry Authority and the Uganda National Council for Science and Technology.

Fred has supervised a number of students and projects dealing with problem animal control around Budongo Forest (a UCF project) and has been involved in overseeing community volunteers and field assistants in conservation education in the Masindi-Hoima region.

He holds a PhD and MSC in Forestry Science Management and policy from Oxford University.

Julia Lloyd - PhD. student and primatologist tour guide, Kibale Forest, Uganda

Julia is currently a PhD. student at Makerere University, Kampala for which she is researching the Impact of tourism on the behaviour and physiology of habituated wild chimpanzees in Kibale Forest National Park.

Previously she worked closely with the Uganda Wildlife Authority and spent three years working with the Jane Goodall Institute as an Ecotourist Consultant. She was awarded a Distinction for her MSc in Primate Conservation from Oxford Brookes University.

Julia was born in the UK and has lived in Uganda for 12 years. She currently lives in a house of traditional construction on the edge of the Kibale Forest.

Harriet Fowler – Consultant in humanitarian and development programme management

Harriet Fowler has many years’ experience working across Africa in large scale humanitarian and development programmes, mostly in the NGO sector. British by birth, she has lived and worked in Uganda for ten years. Her work has taken her from the UK to Vanuatu via India and a number of West and Southern African countries. Since coming to Uganda she has been involved with programme management in Eastern Congo, Pader and most recently Moroto in Karamoja.

Patrick Shah - Owner of The Far Horizons safari company

Patrick was born in Kenya and has lived in Uganda for 13 years. He was key to development of some of UCF's earliest projects. In 2010 he assumed the strategic role of helping support development of the Ugandan team.

Patrick has served on the Executive Committee of the Association of Uganda Tour Operators as secretary, then treasurer and in 2003 he was elected Chairman

Andrew Roberts has lived in Uganda since 1993. Born in Britain, his first project was to help the Ugandan Forest Department set up ecotourism projects. Andrew has worked closely with the Uganda Wildlife Authority since 1998 on a wide variety of projects including general management plans, visitor centres, and tourism development, working in all ten National Parks. In 2001, he was the Landscape Architect/site planner for the Murchison Falls NP General Management Plan. He was nominated as an honorary warden of the Uganda Wildlife Authority in 2008.

Andrew is the author of Uganda's Great Rift Valley, co-writer of the Bradt Travel Guide to Uganda and the creator of the Uganda Maps series which covers the main Protected Areas and tourism zones.

Staff

A small but very important team is in place in Uganda to look after the operational requirements. The office team currently comprises four Ugandan nationals and a volunteer.

Project Manager: Patrick Agaba
Patrick joined UCU in 2006 and is very much the public face of UCF both in Kampala and in the bush! He is responsible for project management, implementation and stakeholder relationships, predominantly with UWA representatives (at head office and in the field) and community consultation. He has a BA from Makere University and previously has worked in conservation projects for USAid contracted companies. He has a wide knowledge of his country and is fluent in many Ugandan languages.

Project Officer: Erik Acanakwo
Erik joined UCU in October 2010 and is assisting Patrick with project implementation, research and community consultation.  He is an Agro-forester with a keen interest in the sustainable use of natural resources for rural development.  For his Masters degree, he undertook a study in Mt. Otzi Forest Reserve in Moyo District, Northern Uganda, looking at the diversity of trees, their uses and land cover change in the forest.

Finance & Administration Officer: Enid Kakooko
Enid joined UCU in 2006. A graduate in Business Studies of Kampala International University Enid provides administrative and financial support to UCF, projects and partners in line with organisational policies and requirements.  Occasionally Enid is allowed out of the Kampala office and she is pictured below with the British actress Joanna Lumley, whom she met while visiting Murchison Falls where Joanna was filming for a programme on the Nile river.

Marketing Officer: Emmanuel Aupal
Emmanuel  joined UCU in Septeber 2011 and takes over from Charlotte Beauvoisin (who was with UCF as a VSO volunteer Business Development Manager from February 2009 to September 2011). Emmanuel is an environmentalist, who worked as an Assistant District Project Coordinator in the Tree Talk WILD Project in Moyo District where he was coordinating and implementing a biodiversity and conservation programme in schools and communities. He is currently pursuing a MSc in Development Management through the Open University.

Volunteer Grants Manager: Alex McCaffery
Currently living in Uganda Alex volunteered to join UCF in September 2011 as Grants Manager to help secure future funding for UCF projects. Alex has a BA in Politics and an MSc in Biodiversity Conservation. Prior to Uganda she worked in the UK as a Conservation Adviser for Natural England and has also worked in the Caribbean focusing on sustainable development and natural resouce management.