(Mandai Nature supports Wildlife Alliance’s efforts to protect the 15,000km2 Cardamom Rainforest Landscape in Cambodia from threats such as illegal logging and poaching. Photo Credit: Wildlife Alliance)

Established in December 2020 by Temasek and Mandai Park Holdings (MPH), Mandai Nature was created with the goal of elevating nature conservation efforts and mitigating global environmental crises. Temasek Trust provides governance and financial oversight for this joint effort, ensuring that the $50m endowment set aside for Mandai Nature delivers positive and maximum impact on wildlife, nature, and local communities.

Preserving An Ecosystem Under Threat

The threat of environmental disaster is not new to us. In 2022, the World Economic Forum’s Global Risks Report ranked climate action failure, extreme weather events, and biodiversity loss and ecosystem collapse as the top three global risks over the next ten years. With a million species at risk of extinction and a record number of habitats being lost around the world, it is all the more pertinent that governments and agencies establish programmes to address these critical issues.

As a small, island city-state, Singapore’s rich and diverse ecosystems are particularly susceptible to the forces of climate change. These threats include rising sea levels, extreme weather events, and higher temperatures due to the build-up of greenhouse gases, amongst other things. Temperatures in Singapore have risen 0.25°C per decade since the 1940s, and eight of the ten warmest years on record have occurred in the 21st century, all of which pose significant risk to our flora and fauna.

Helping Habitats, Wildlife and People Thrive

Mandai Nature’s work is centered around the main pillars of Wildlife, Ecosystems, and Community. These pillars translate into Mandai Nature’s focus on protecting threatened species, preserving and restoring habitats for tropical landscapes such as forests, mangroves and peatlands, and actively engaging local communities in conservation efforts.

The organisation aims to meet its goals through a variety of ways: supporting partnerships and initiatives that directly and positively impact the survival of threatened Southeast Asian species and their habitats, developing solutions that increase connectivity between habitats, as well as working with local communities and partners to simultaneously create economic opportunities and scale up ‘on-ground’ efforts and collaboration, especially looking at conservation tourism and regenerative agriculture.

Mandai Nature believes in a bottom-up approach to catalyse change that brings benefits to both nature and communities. In collaborating with partners worldwide to link international, regional and local efforts, Mandai Nature will also raise the profile and voice of Asia in global contexts and conversations.

Mandai Nature continues to cultivate educational institutions, zoo associations, philanthropists, and interest groups to create a vibrant community that is invested in taking care of Southeast Asia’s unique biodiversity and wildlife.

Mandai Nature actively contributes to protecting the planet for a sustainable world, as it continues to pursue and achieve the goals of wildlife conservation, ecosystem protection and community engagement for a healthier world into the future.