Leonardo DiCaprio backs Napier University project in Kenya
ACTOR Leonardo DiCaprio’s environmental charity is to help bankroll the expansion of a Scots university conservation project.
Leonardo DiCaprio's foundation donated £37,000 to Edinburgh Napier's mangrove project
Edinburgh’s Napier University will receive £37,000 (US$50,000) from the Leonardo DiCaprio Foundation to expand its pioneering work in Kenya.
Mikoko Pamoja – Mangroves Together in Swahili – sees scientists working with villagers to protect endangered forests.
The project at Gazi Bay, south of Mombasa, has won a United Nations prize. Now the Oscar-winning star of The Revenant and The Wolf of Wall Street is to help repeat that success in the Vanga Blue Forest.
The project has already won a prize from the United Nations, DiCaprio is the latest to take interest
DiCaprio said he was proud to support the environmental work of more than 100 organisations, tackling the “urgent, existential challenges of climate change”.
Professor Mark Huxham, who is leading the university’s work in the area, said: “Protecting mangroves helps the people who rely on them, the wildlife that lives in them, and the climate upon which we all depend.”