All year round we anticipate its arrival: a whole day dedicated to the animal we cherish most!! It was so inspiring to see the world come together for a day and spread awareness of the status of lions and their conservation. Lions were everywhere! Unfortunately, many of the lovely images that were shared also came with devastating facts on the plight of lions. We continue to fight for a future that will one day be able to celebrate World Lion Day with much more positive statistics.
 
As a Foundation, we celebrated the momentous day with two wonderfully exciting events!
 
The first event was the Tusk Lion Trail, an initiative dedicated to raising money for the conservation of wild lions in Africa.
 
On 10th August 2021, life-size lion sculptures designed and made by some of the planet’s foremost artists, musicians, and sportspeople, were released to roam the streets of iconic locations worldwide. The goal was to highlight the threats currently faced by ‘the King of Beasts’, and to raise vital funds to support community conservation and livelihoods impacted by Covid-19 across Africa.
 
An art trail like no other, the sculptures took individuals on a tour of iconic locations around the globe and brought to life the stories of these iconic predators as well as the people who work tirelessly to protect them. These locations included London, Bristol, and Edinburgh in the UK, the Hamptons in the USA, Wellington in New Zealand, Nairobi in Kenya, and Sydney in Australia.
 
Our Foundation proudly took part in this spectacular initiative, sponsoring a lion in partnership with the incredible David Yarrow.

Our lion, along with another sponsored by Genesis Imaging, were decorated with his beautiful photos of the sanctuary’s lions. We were thrilled to have the opportunity for the lions in our care to play a role once more in the conservation of their wild counterparts. Our lion ended up in the global pride, located in Edinburgh’s St James Quarter, whilst David Yarrow’s lion found itself in the London pride, in The Royal Exchange. We were so happy to see our lions proudly displayed, a bold statement for wild lions and their conservation.

The second event we celebrated on World Lion Day was the relaunch of our Youth Ambassadors Programme, previously known as Students for Lions.
 
Initially linked to our #choosehope campaign, we decided that this programme is big enough to stand on its own. We believe children are the future of conservation and we want to make sure that the passionate youth of today have a way to do their part for lion conservation from a young age!
 
Our programme consists of a ready-made presentation for young individuals to share with their community, in an effort to help spread awareness of the status of lions and their dwindling numbers in the wild. The presentation was created by our original youth ambassadors, Finn and Elliot, who opened our eyes to what passionate young conservationists are capable of.