Leonardo DiCaprio will donate $43 million to rebuild nature on Galapagos

The newly created Re:wild organization, founded by DiCaprio and a group of conservation scientists, intends to collaborate with the Galapagos National Park directorate, the Island Conservation organization and local communities to renature the entire Galapagos archipelago, as well as all Latin American archipelagos in the Pacific.

$43 million are intended to fund projects for natural restoration on the island of Floreana, where 54 endangered species live; the plans include the restoration of locally extinct species, such as the Galipago forger. Among other things, money is intended to cover the costs of captive breeding of the Conolophus marthae lizard and the introduction of measures to protect the island from the effects of ecotourism.

"When I visited Galapagos, I met Paula Castano and other environmental heroes in Ecuador who worked daily to save one of the most irreplaceable places on our planet," DiCaprio tweeted on Monday.

"We have degraded three-quarters of wild places and pushed over a million species to the brink of extinction. If we do not take decisive action, more than half of the remaining wild areas of Earth may disappear over the next few decades," he added.

"By 97% of the land area of Galapagos is covered by the status of a national park. We're not trying to remove people. We are all working together to restore these ecosystems and to support the community. They want to be able to further develop with nature," Castano said.

"For example, in Florean you can see Darwin’s cold right next door. If you go to the beach, somewhere in the corners you'll see sea lions basking in the sun next to you. They are not afraid of people because we work together," she added.

Castano explained that the effects of natural reconstruction "do not have to wait five, 20 or 50 years, these are immediate results".

DiCaprio has already donated over $100 million to various environmental programs and projects.

Source: PAP