Dr. Festus Ihwagi
Senior Scientist & Research Policy Lead
Festus, a Zoologist by training, joined Save the Elephants’ research team in 2005 with a special interest in the application of GIS and Remote Sensing in understanding elephant movement behaviour. He is an expert on aerial elephant surveys and has served as the technical advisor in numerous aerial surveys of elephants and other wildlife in East Africa.
He helped set up Africa’s most successful participatory (bringing together communities, government agencies, and private landowners) program for monitoring the illegal killing of elephants in the Laikipia-Samburu landscape.
His other research interests include understanding the drivers, spatial and temporal dynamics of poaching across the African elephant range, the subject of his doctoral thesis at the University of Twente in the Netherlands.
As the Policy Lead, he liaises closely with other conservation stakeholders on matters related to landscape conservation planning. He manages Save the Elephants PostGraduate Research Fund, a mentorship program for young Kenyan graduates building their careers in conservation. His full profile and publications can be seen here.