​Elephant Parade names Elephant Family as its exclusive official conservation partner

Elephant Parade has announced that Elephant Family will become its official conservation partner from 2016. The global collaboration will allow both organisations to pool skills, resources and contacts to help fight for the future of the elephant through a combination of tactics, namely: awareness raising, opinion former advocacy, conservation campaigning, fundraising and education through art.

Elephant Parade is the world’s leading public art exposition that raises awareness on elephant conservation issues and engages people around the world through distinctive, creative, empowering art – capturing the spirit of Mosha, the baby elephant whose true story of overcoming adversity inspired the global Elephant Parade movement.

This partnership marks the start of a new journey for both brands that last worked together during the 2010 Elephant Parade event in London, which raised more than £4 million. Since this milestone event, social enterprise Elephant Parade has run a further 10 Elephant Parade events in the USA, Latin America, Asia and Europe, connecting millions of people with elephant issues through art. Elephant Family, a leading charity, has continued to campaign globally on elephant conservation issues and has itself run a series of landmark fundraising events, including the Faberge Egg Hunt in New York and last year’s breath-taking rickshaw race across India, an event that celebrated the life and tireless conservation work of founder, Mark Shand.

How the partnership will work:

• Elephant Parade has committed to donating 20% of its profits from its Elephant Parade events and other events to Elephant Family each year - with a guaranteed minimum annual donation of €50,000.
• Elephant Family will continue to support baby elephant Mosha, who is cared for by The Friends of the Asian Elephant (FAE) at their centre in Lampang, Thailand. FAE operates the world’s first hospital for elephants, where more than 3,900 cases of sick and injured elephants have been treated since 1993. Elephant Family will commit an annual investment of one million Thai Baht (1,000,000 THB) to support Mosha. This donation will support the care and maintenance of this three-legged elephant, who sadly lost her leg in a landmine accident - a baby elephant that is at the heart of Elephant Parade’s story and ethos.

The work that Elephant Parade’s donations will support:

Elephant Family’s projects span from India to Indonesia. Since inception it has supported more than 150 projects to save elephants from extinction with its primary focus on strategic and targeted programming that delivers the strongest, most tangible benefits for long-term elephant conservation.

Elephant Family’s three main areas of work comprise of:

• Restoring habitat – in the past 100 years, elephants have lost 90% of their forest habitat. Elephant Family is working in India to create ‘corridors’ between forests and reconnect wild elephant herds that have been separated by roads, illegal deforestation and human settlements.
• Preventing conflict – with humans settling closer to wild elephants every day, interactions between people and elephants are becoming more fatal. The solution to overcome these conflicts is to educate people on safer ways to discourage elephants from their land.
• Improving welfare – Elephant Family’s priority is to keep elephants wild, but even more fundamental than this is ensuring their basic survival as a species. This is why Elephant Family is working so intensively in Sumatra and Indonesia, to help both wild and captive elephants with veterinary support.

Mike Spits, Founder and CEO of Elephant Parade commented: “It is with great pride that we have reunited with Elephant Family after a number of years running our own foundation – The Asian Elephant Foundation. By working with Elephant Family we can get back to doing what we do best – running our iconic Elephant Parade events around the world and working as a social enterprise to connect the worlds of art, charity and business to forge partnerships that can work together to give the elephant a brighter future. Wherever we go, our public art expositions capture the public’s imagination and our unique elephant designs inspire people to think about elephants and the need to secure their future. By committing financial support to the work of Elephant Family, we believe we are putting money in the hands of the people who are really making a difference to the future of the elephant. At the end of the day, it is all about the elephants – a passion we have shared since day one.”

Ruth Powys, CEO of Elephant Family commented: “We are absolutely delighted to be working with Elephant Parade again as its official Conservation Partner. This partnership and the financial commitment from Elephant Parade will help power our ambitious work on elephant conservation. Since working together for the 2010 London exposition, the plight of the elephant globally has intensified and this calls for everyone that cares about the future of the elephant to collaborate and work together. Elephant Parade and Elephant Family tackle the same problem from different starting points, which is precisely why the collaboration between us is all the more powerful. We already have some exciting plans taking shape for 2016 and 2017 and I’m very excited about what we can achieve working together. “