PLENARY SPEAKERS

Morris Gosling

Morris Gosling is an Emeritus Professor in the Institute for Sustainability at the University of Newcastle, UK. He previously worked for the UK Scientific Civil Service, for the Zoological Society of London and as Professor of Animal Behaviour at the University of Newcastle. He has been studying the population ecology and behaviour of Hartmann's mountain zebra in Namibia, and coordinating the Mountain Zebra Project, since 2004. This work uses an individual-based approach and aims to obtain basic knowledge about individual strategies and population processes and to provide the information needed for evidence-based conservation practice. When in Namibia he is based at the Namibia Nature Foundation in Windhoek.

Wayne Linklater

Wayne Linklater is Associate Professor of Conservation Science at Victoria University of Wellington. He is also a Research Associated with the Centre for African Conservation Ecology at Nelson Mandela University and currently Visiting Scholar in the Department of Environmental Science, Policy & Management at the University of California, Berkeley. His research involve a range of topics from large mammal behaviour, ecology and management (mostly on horses, rhino and elephant), to human-dimensions ecology (like human-wildlife conflict, wildlife crime, and studies of people's pro-environmental behaviour), to critiques of conservation science, culture and policy. He is writing a book about the Kaimanawa Wild Horses and research experience with them for a general audience. Its working title is "Horses of the last land".

Albano Beja-Pereira

Albano is  a population Genetics and Group Leader at the Center for Research on Biodiversity and Genetic Resources from the University of Porto, Portugal (CIBIO-UP). His research topics are on population and conservation genomics of the wild ass-like species (Asia and Africa). He has been generating genetic data from noninvasive samples from all natural populations of African and Asiatic wild asses to assess population diversity, structuring and connectivity. The resulting data will provide guidance to the management of conservation programs on these species, and provide tools to use on the identification and provenance (at the population level) of biological samples or speciments from museum collections, apprehended from illegal hunting activities. Albano has also been involved in population and conservation genetics projects on asiatic wild Ovis and Capra populations.