Born Free Foundation - Keep Wildlife in the Wild

You can view or download the full version of the Born Free Foundation Trustees' Report + Audited Group Accounts for the year ended 31 March 2011 here >

Chairman's Introduction

It gives me great pleasure to introduce the charity’s Trustees’ Annual Report, which sets out for our supporters and the general public what our charity has achieved in the past twelve months, and our future plans.

It has been a very eventful year, with many important developments in terms of our charitable work. The economic environment has been very challenging so it is particularly encouraging that our income and project expenditure have held up well.

The section covering the charity’s Strategy and Plans on pages 4 to 7 highlights how we are delivering our charitable Objects and our Chief Executive comments in detail on our projects and key achievements on pages 8 to 17 and summarises our animal welfare, conservation and education work.

However, following the practise of Virginia McKenna OBE, my predecessor, I should like to highlight three particular pieces of work that for me demonstrate the range and quality of what we do:

• The continued good progress of our joint project with the Ethiopia Wildlife Conservation Authority to establish a Wildlife Rescue, Conservation and Education Centre (Ensessakotteh – ‘animal footprints’). This is an ambitious plan, sensitive to local needs, that represents a significant medium term funding commitment.
• For many years we have campaigned for a ban on the use of wild animals in circuses and other public performances. It has been an uphill struggle trying to convince successive Governments (and particularly their civil servants) of the rightness of our case. Although the Coalition Government appears inclined to opt for regulation we will continue to maintain pressure for an outright ban.
• The EU Zoo Inquiry 2011, which we are leading with ENDCAP1 (a forum for European wildlife NGOs2), that is monitoring the implementation of EC Directive 1999/22 by producing country specific research based on careful technical criteria. This will provide a basis for action by the EU and national governments in the years ahead.

More details of these and other projects will be found in the report but of course none of our achievements would have been possible without our loyal and generous members and our many sponsors.

Finally, I would like to thank our staff and our excellent volunteers for their continuing hard work and dedication. Will Travers and his senior team – Alison Hood (Programmes Director), Anne Tudor (Marketing Director), Shirley Galligan (PR Director), Simon Allen (Operations Director), Stephen Chandler (Finance Manager) and Jo Wakefield (Office Operations Manager) – provide first class leadership. But we are exceptionally fortunate that we have so many long service employees, and that our new recruits have blended in so well.

Michael Reyner
Chair of Trustees
6th September 2011