Iris de Winter

Iris has always been interested in nature. After her Master’s Degree in Biology (Wageningen University, the Netherlands), she finished her doctoral research on the consequences of anthropogenic habitat changes for the health of lemurs and published multiple scientific articles on this subject. Meanwhile, Iris was chair of the student staff council of the university, incubation manager, supporting start-up companies who were working on sustainable solutions, and research coordinator in a conservation project on blue-eyed black lemurs for Apenheul. She currently coordinates and teaches the course Wildlife Conservation at Utrecht University, organizes student conservation excursions in southern Africa, is a hiking guide in mountainous areas throughout Europe, and tour leader of (conservation) tours for several travel agencies. She is also member of the Rewilding Europe team, where she is responsible for the major donor relations and the associated fieldtrips to the diverse rewilding initiatives. Iris has a drive to apply science-based conservation to contribute to the preservation of threatened natural areas and species. This is the main reason behind her effort to found and become chair of the ‘Manga Maso’ foundation.

Jelco van Brakel