17th June 2006: Ian Redmond, GRASP Chief Consultant, founder and chairman of the Ape Alliance, has been appointed OBE in the Queen’s Birthday Honours List. The citation reads: Chairman, Ape Alliance, Co-founder Elefriends and UK Rhino Group. For services to conservation.
In his role, Ian has been visiting the 23 great ape range states in Africa and Asia and works with the governments to ensure their involvement in great ape conservation. It was Ian's idea which lead to the launch of GRASP in 2001. In addition, Ian founded the Ape Alliance, an alliance of NGOs working on great ape issues; he leads documentary film crews to the mountain gorillas, he writes articles for major magazines and he speaks at a variety of fora, on the plight of the great apes.
Ian puts his dedication to the plight of great apes ahead of personal gain. He would rather remain a freelance consultant, able to work for GRASP and other ape related causes, than receive better and more secure remuneration working for any one organization.
Early in Ian’s career, when he was a field assistant to Dian Fossey and her pioneering study of the mountain gorillas in the Virungas, he chose to spend his time on the unglamorous and labour intensive but vital activities of anti poaching patrols and snare removal, which had a direct impact on the survival of the gorillas, rather than pursue academic research interests which would have lead to a Ph.D.
The GRASP secretariat and all the great apes congratulates Ian for this prestigous award.
