Strategies for Effective Nature-Based Tourism in Africa
with World Wildlife Fund & Africa Nature-Based Tourism Platform
Learn the basics of conservation economics from the experts themselves.
Designed by Conservation Strategy Fund for the Africa Nature-Based Tourism Platform, supported by World Wildlife Fund
This course will cover fundamental economic and finance tools for successful nature-based tourism strategies across Africa. By enabling local communities and organisations to use economic tools to show the value of nature and communicate the true costs and benefits of human activities and development projects, we can help countries and communities to make smarter development decisions that support nature conservation and improve human well-being. This course has concluded as of June 28, 2024.
Meet Your Course Instructors
Training Program Director, Conservation Strategy Fund Natalia Sanin-Acevedo
A native of Colombia, Natalia studied biology in her homeland, Medellin, and holds a master's in Conservation Leadership from the University of Cambridge in the UK. Natalia has been part of CSF since 2011, supporting various training and research programs worldwide, including creating CSF's Numbers for Nature Training Institute.
Natalia is a dynamic and seasoned conservation leader with over a decade of experience driving impactful capacity-building initiatives worldwide. She brings a wealth of expertise in participatory research, knowledge exchange, and training program development. Natalia has proven experience designing and implementing in-person and virtual learning programs and strong project management skills, including setting goals, developing work plans, and monitoring progress toward objectives. She has excellent communication and facilitation skills, and the ability to engage diverse audiences and foster collaboration among participants.
David Johnson
David is currently a Senior Lecturer in the Economics Department at the University of Wisconsin - Madison. Prior to moving to UWM, he taught Microeconomics and Macroeconomic analysis at Wellesley College, Harvard University and Stanford University. He has received wide recognition for his teaching talent and animated style, and strives to make his courses interesting, important and relevant. David has been teaching in CSF courses since 2004.
Hugo van Zyl
Hugo Van Zyl holds a PhD in economics and has 25 years’ experience as a consultant in environmental economics, biodiversity conservation finance and socio-economic impact assessment. He has conducted over 70 economic and socio-economic appraisals of complex infrastructure, industrial, residential, mixed use, mining, energy, tourism and conservation projects in order to inform decision-making. In the process, he has built deep experience in techniques such as cost-benefit analysis. He has conducted, co-ordinated and published research in ecosystem services assessment and valuation, biodiversity finance and offsets, payments for ecosystem services, environmental policy reform, strategic assessment and protected area financing. His contributions to policy process have been relatively wide ranging and have included economic inputs and guidance to national water tariff, air pollution, biodiversity conservation and finance, biofuels, mine closure funding and climate change policy. Country experience includes South Africa, Namibia, Ethiopia, Botswana, Mauritius, Cape Verde, Seychelles, Uganda, Comoros, Nigeria, Georgia, Kazakhstan, Russia and Armenia.
Thaís Vilela
Thaís Vilela is an applied economist with a focus on energy and the environment. In her work, Thaís evaluates government policies using broad measures of benefits and costs: economic, social, and environmental. She has written reports on infrastructure projects, such as dams and roads; protected areas, their impact on the environment and local communities, and their touristic potential; the design of marketplaces for environmental reserve quotas; energy planning; and fuel markets. Her work with CSF has been published in respected academic journals, such as PNAS and Nature Communications. Before joining CSF in 2015, Thaís was a visiting scholar at UC Berkeley and worked at the consulting firm Engenho and the think tank Grupo de Economia da Energia. Thaís has a Ph.D. from the PUC-Rio, a Master's degree from the UFRJ, and a Bachelor's degree from FGV-EPGE, all in Economics. Her experience spans Brazil, Chile, Bolivia, Paraguay, Panama, Ecuador, Canada, Kenya, Namibia, and Nepal.
David Meyers
David is an environmental finance expert and entrepreneur with more than 25 years of experience in the field. He is currently the Executive Director of the Conservation Finance Alliance. From 2012-2018, David was a Senior Technical Advisor for the BIOFIN/UNDP project. David spent well over a decade in Madagascar and helped the country plan and execute a doubling of the area under conservation. He holds a PhD in Biological Anthropology and Anatomy from Duke University, and an MBA from the Yale School of Management.
Nuredin Juhar
Nuredin joined CSF as an Economist in 2023. Nuredin is also a researcher and Ph.D. Candidate at Addis Ababa University and the University of Gothenburg in Sweden through a collaborative program specializing in Environmental and natural resource economics. From 2014 to 2017 he served as a research and community service coordinator at Debereberhan University in his country. He has also worked at the Policy Studies Institute (PSI) / Environment and climate research center (ECRC)/EfD as a research officer since May 2022 in Ethiopia. He received his MSc. in Economics from the University of Gondar in Ethiopia, focusing on forest valuations in the country. Nuredin also holds certificates in impact evaluation from the Ethiopian Economic Association (EEA), and university leadership, governance, and management from the Maastricht School of Management in the Netherlands.
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